


Malibu

by StrikeLikeACobraKai



Category: Cobra Kai (Web Series), Karate Kid (Movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst with a Happy Ending, Beach House, Dancing, Drinking Games, Eventual Happy Ending, Eventual Romance, Exes, F/M, Falling In Love, Forgiveness, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Gifts, Haunted by the past, Hotels, I mean EVENTUALLY resolved, Karate, Long-Distance Relationship, Love, Matchmaking, Motorcycles, New Years Eve, POV First Person, POV Johnny, Parties, Rated E for Eventually Explicit, Redemption, Semi-Public Sex, Skinny Dipping, Slow Burn, Soccer, Some problematic 80s attitudes which don't get called out, Two-Time All-Valley Champ, Unresolved Emotional Tension, Unresolved Romantic Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Unsafe Sex, Vague mentions of past underage behaviour, Walks On The Beach, brief recreational drug use, let's make a deal, making it work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 18:02:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 63,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27590390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrikeLikeACobraKai/pseuds/StrikeLikeACobraKai
Summary: The (young) Johnny/Ali fix-it and redemption fic.1986. A couple years have passed since everything went down with Johnny and Ali, and the fallout for their friends. Everyone’s moved away or moved on. But… maybe not so much when they actually see each other again.At Jimmy’s beach house, the Cobra Kais meet old friends and exes. All Johnny wants is a chance to be friends with Ali, but she isn’t sure that’s even possible. He has a hell of a lot to make up for, and Ali won’t go easy on him.Bobby is nursing a secret, long-term crush. Dutch and Tommy like to play the field, like experts in the sport. Ali’s group think they are all idiots, except perhaps Jimmy, who is hell-bent on being a grown up, and planning his future with Jennifer.Everyone has a chance for new beginnings, but how many of them will take it?
Relationships: Bobby Brown & Johnny Lawrence, Bobby Brown/Barbara (Karate Kid), Dutch (Karate Kid)/Original Female Character(s), Jimmy (Karate Kid)/Jennifer, Johnny Lawrence/Ali Mills, Tommy (Karate Kid)/Original Female Character(s), past Susan/Tommy (Karate Kid)
Comments: 328
Kudos: 48
Collections: Malibu-niverse





	1. Wednesday: All the Best Laid Plans

**Author's Note:**

> This is the fix-it I’ve needed in my life, and hopefully it works for you.
> 
> Johnny’s life here maybe isn’t on the rough track that would lead to where he is at the start of Cobra Kai. He’s dropped out of college, but he’s gone back, and he’s trying to make it work. He’s also spent a few years dealing with some of the shit, but this story isn’t about that.
> 
> So he’s not such a total trainwreck, although I’m sure you know he’s gonna become a mess as soon as he’s around Ali again (in the good way).
> 
> This is pretty angsty at times, and the tension is emotional, not sexual, for a longggg time (until that changes). Prepare for the slowest burn in your life, but I believe the eventual pay-off is REALLY worth your while :)
> 
> There is a sizeable focus on Bobby and Dutch, and Tommy and Jimmy play a big part in the plot in other ways. The OCs are there because 10 named characters don’t really make a house party, and I’ve tried to take inspiration from unnamed characters seen on screen in The Karate Kid, such as at the beach, and give you their names in this story. They don’t play as big of a part as Johnny’s group, and Ali’s girls. 
> 
> [NOTE FROM THE FUTURE: Unanticipated, one particular OC has developed a small cult following with readers, but I'll let you see that unfold in Chapter notes as we go]

**Winter, 1986**

It sounds cocky, but it’s not often I feel like a loser.

But Bobby and I probably partly deserve to be called that, considering the jitters we have. It’s embarrassing.

I mean, driving along in Malibu with the top down, we’re dressed pretty well, and I know it wouldn’t be hard for us to turn around and head anywhere else, say to Santa Monica, and pick up some babes. We’ve done it. It’s easier than you can imagine.

But of course, like a chump, he’s got it bad for a specific chick. Because I like the guy, and we don’t see each other so often anymore, now that we go to different colleges, I’ve decided not to be a jerk about it for once. So I’m pretending I haven’t noticed.

And me, well.

Someone tells me there’s even a one percent chance that Ali might be at a party I’m invited to, and apparently not only does that mean I physically can’t _not_ go, yes, even after all this goddamn time, but also that I’m sweating it.

Well, screw that. It’s time to man up, and that’s what I’m gonna do. And Bobby’s gonna have to find his balls. He won’t be given any other option.

We’re gonna walk in to Jimmy’s like we own the place, and be ice cool. I’m not gonna be some kind of nervous dick if Ali’s there, just because I haven’t seen her since the summer, and even then, I didn’t get to actually talk to her.

It’s weird to think that she’s outta high school now, and I wonder who she went to prom with. Probably woulda been something I could’ve asked Jimmy, since his girl is from Ali’s old group, well, the outer circle, but it’s not like I care, right?

“So, Johnny,” my friend says, from shotgun. “Do you really think Ali will be there, like Jimmy said?”

“For fuck’s sake,” I say irritably. The words spill out before I can think better. Not Bobby’s fault, shit. Just bad timing with my thoughts.

“Sorry for the touchy subject.” I can hear the sarcasm, and I can also feel his eyes on me. I try to calm it down. “Can we just not talk about her? Maybe she will. Maybe she won’t. Not like it’s gonna ruin my night, either way.”

Bobby just does this quiet laugh, like I’m full of shit, so I punch him. I mean, pretty lightly.

“Hey, chill out. I get it, you don’t wanna talk about it.”

“Right.”

“It’s ancient history.”

“Right,” I say, with a warning tone, because he’s saying my lines, my exact lines, that I used to say to the guys whenever any of them brought her up. Back in the day, after she broke up with me. Trust Bobby to remember.

It really is ancient now, and we broke up longer ago than the time we were together. Weird how it took so long for that milestone, though. It was just this past summer.

I thought I was over her, well, I am, most of the time, but sometimes I get to thinking, and it never ends well.

When I’m away from the guys, and away from the old places, I’ve moved on, and I see chicks just like everyone else does, and everything’s pretty fine, even if none of them have been anything special. It’s really only in the holidays where it comes back sometimes.

I wonder if it’s a mistake to go tonight.

It probably is, in fact it almost definitely is.

But like I said, I just can’t not go. I can tell myself I’m going for Jimmy, cos he’s got this whole idea of getting everyone together again, like the good old days. Even if I half think he just wants to show off the beach house, and I can’t blame him there.

But I’m not just going for him. I would, if that’s all there was, but it’s her, of course.

She might be there. In my wildest dreams, maybe I’ll at least get to say hi, even though she’ll more than likely brush me off. She will, or she’ll ignore me or something.

So yeah, like I said, doesn’t sound like the greatest plan, but here I am doing it anyway.

“Hey look, I’m chilled, okay?”

“If you say so.” Bobby sounds less than convinced. “So uh, do you think any of the friends will be there? The ones in the year below us?”

And here he goes. I wonder if he’ll come out and tell me, yet. Stupid moron thinks I haven’t worked it out, even though literally anyone could have.

“Sure they will.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see him running a finger along the door upholstery. “Like, who, do you reckon?”

“Oh, Aaron and Greg.”

“I mean girls.”

“Oh,” I say, as if I didn’t already know that’s what he meant.

“Well, I guess Susan, maybe. And Connie. Some of those others, I don’t remember all their names.”

“How about, what’s that girl, Barbara?”

Does he seriously think I’m buying that bullshit? I pretty much can’t resist making this hard for him, now.

“Which ones that?” I ask, as if Barbara didn’t used to sit in the back of my car with Tommy and Susan.

“C’mon, she’s the one with the kinda blonde, or sorta light red hair, you know, she’s tall.”

“Oh yeah,” I play along, as I turn into Colony Road and start looking out for numbers. “I dunno, Bobby.” I’m hiding a smile. “Would you like it if she was?”

“Oh no, I don’t care. I’m just trying to think about all the old people we used to hang out with in Junior year, you know.”

“Didn’t you say a girl called Barbara was cheering at USC? Same girl?”

“Yeah,” he says sheepishly. “I see her training sometimes, when I got practice.”

“You ever talk to her?”

“Nah. Haven’t for ages, with the Daniel thing and everything.”

We’re nearly there. I’ve been here a few times when we’ve gone to the beach, but some of the houses look the same from the back, and it’s easy to miss.

I see the right number flash by as I slow down, and find a spot on the shoulder, where there’s this turnout for parking. A bunch of people are here already, mostly sports cars, although that huge, black Grand National just has to be the car Dutch was telling us about buying. I slot the car in at a slight angle, next to Tommy’s blue ‘Vette.

We jump out, and I reach in to put the top up. Bobby’s popped his collar, and I see him ruffling his hair in the side mirror.

We start back up the road, and I slip my hands in my pockets.

The door’s open, so we walk in toward the source of the noise. The first thing you see coming into Jimmy’s from the back is this big hallway, carpeted, with really high ceilings and pictures along the panelled walls, with rooms going off both sides. There’s maybe eight on this level, including the room we’re walking to, the main one at the end, which the hall opens into.

It’s got the same cream carpet and the room stretches all the way across the beach side of the house, the front, like twenty-five or thirty yards. It’s all windows and glass folding doors on that side, this big entertaining area, with a few huge paintings on the other walls, modern art stuff. It’s full of our friends, and some people we used to be able to call friends, all sitting and standing around in groups, like a few dozen people at least.

Tommy spots us first, on his way inside from out front. “Dutch!” he calls, to some unseen area of the house, and then some feet bound down the stairs to our right.

“You’re here!” Dutch is moving in for high fives, and I slap him on the back, Tommy too.

“Started without us, huh?” I ask, nodding at the tumbler in Dutch’s hand.

“Relax, there’s plenty where that came from.”

“So, how the hell are you guys?” Tommy is asking, while we move as a group to the bar.

I nod at a few familiar faces when people wave at us, but I’m not interested in talking to anyone else until I catch up properly with Tommy, Dutch and Jimmy.

There’s a semicircle of curved white sofas in the middle of the room, the seats in a few pieces but joined up to sit twenty or more people, depending on how cosy they wanna get. That group of guys and girls sitting on one side looks like Ali’s group, although not Ali.

Bobby noticed Barbara, but it looks like he’s gonna pretend he doesn’t know her, which might be for the best, because I detect a frostiness coming our way from them.

In the back corner to the left is a huge wooden bar, with a front that goes up pretty high at the top, with colored glass panels.

“I’m hoping those cupboards and shelves are full of enough supplies,” Bobby comments, before Tommy emerges clutching some whisky and glasses.

“Set your minds at ease, my brothers.”

Some drinks, rocks, are thrust at us.

“Saw the car,” I tell Dutch. “Real nice.”

“Isn’t she?” he says eagerly. “Purrs like a goddamn kitten. She’s already become the most important lady in my life.”

Dutch would never call an actual woman a lady, but the car, sure. Bobby laughs at him. “You’re a weird dude, man.”

I can’t help doing a re-scan of the room to see if I missed her, and Tommy catches me at it.

I know this because he gives me this little smirk, which makes me consider taking his block off, but he nods his head at the patio out front, which we can see through all the glass.

Thankfully he doesn’t say anything out loud, so neither do I as I turn to look, and we can both just pretend that never happened.

The glass folding doors are open as far as they go, onto the patio, this brick-paved area out by the beach. It’s got a bunch of umbrellas and chairs, and a few tables, where you can sit and look out over the sea, although the umbrellas are all folded shut, since it's winter.

I see her.

She’s out there, with a guy and a girl, and they all have their backs to us. The sky’s blue behind her, because it’s been a pretty clear day. She’s wearing a sweater over pretty tight, white jeans, that don’t touch her ankles, and she’s got white yachting shoes on. She looks as much like the girl next door as ever, with her hairband, and to be honest, it’s like being back at high school for a second. She hasn’t changed that I can see, her hair, the way she stands. I think I just heard her talking, too, kinda laughing about something.

Shit, took me a second to notice the guy she’s talking to is Jimmy, which places the girl as Jennifer, which I realise she is, when I look at her properly.

I force myself to turn back to the guys again, and listen to Dutch telling us about the car.

I ask, “And I guess you’re working on her yourself?”

“Of course, what kinda man you take me for? Besides, ain’t nobody else getting their hands on my baby.”

Bobby is still laughing. “I’m kinda worried about your relationship.”

Tommy grins. “You know Dutch. There’s only ever room for one permanent woman in his life, and she needs to have an engine.”

Dutch makes a satisfied sound of agreement, and it’s pretty sexual. “She needs a turbo, baby.”

“What are you talking about?” asks Jimmy, sidling up to us. “Actually, on second thoughts…”

“You don’t wanna know,” I tell him. “Hey, Jimmy.” We’re reaching out to slap each other on the back, and he’s greeting Bobby too.

“Nice house you got here,” Bobby says.

“Yeah, it’s not bad,” I agree. “You been living here since the summer?”

“Yeah, off and on. My parents decided to see if I could make it on my own, so they gave me the keys. It’s great.”

He’s looking around proudly, and I guess he should. The place looks great, and everyone’s having a good time here.

“Tough life,” Tommy says.

Jimmy smiles widely. “Tell me about it. So, let’s find somewhere to hang out? You guys gotta tell me everything you been up to.”

*

I don’t know how long we sit on the patio together, just the five of us, with some deck chairs all pulled together in a bunch. Ali had disappeared by the time we got out there, and so we chatted and drank and chatted some more. I guess we’re giving off a vibe to leave us alone, which people seem to respect, which is nice, because this is important for us. We hardly ever all get together at the same time now, so we really make the most of it. Some of the talk was serious, about college, and where Dutch and Jimmy are working, and just general updates, and some of the talk was pretty dirty, as guys do, and especially if Dutch is involved and Tommy is there to encourage him.

I heard some people coming up the steps from the beach at one point, and that ended up being Ali and Jennifer coming back up. The wooden steps are at the far end of the bricks from where we are, and the rest of the beach frontage has some plants growing down the dunes, but low enough that you can look over and see the sea.

Ali and Jennifer paused at the top when they saw us, and they looked at each other.

Ali crossed to the folding doors and went right inside, although she did look at me on the way past, and it wasn’t the worst look she ever gave me.

Jennifer came over to us and Jimmy put his arm around her, making sure we all remembered her from school, which we did, and then she left us alone again.

“She seems nice,” Bobby said, and of course, Jimmy talked about how nice, for a bit, and wouldn’t give any of the details Dutch asked for, which made me realise it was pretty serious. Good for Jimmy.

I think he might have had the least luck with chicks back in the day, so it’s about time it turned for him.

*

The sun gets low, which brings some people out, or most people out, to watch it set, over to the right, so the five of us break up, because people start coming up to me, and to the guys, and so we mingle. There’s swapping news, comparing sports teams or classes, and it’s interesting to see how some people look different, the ones I haven’t seen for ages, like they’ve changed the way they dress, and things like that. I can see Ali’s at the centre of her group too, but I’m not gonna stand here and stare at her.

Jimmy’s gone all out tonight. He’s got, like, caterers in, and there are two waiters bringing trays of cocktail food around, and a waitress who brings around champagne. I’m with Tommy and another guy, now, Steve, from our year.

Tommy thinks the drinks are pretty funny. “What the fuck is this?” he asks, as he reaches for one.

“It’s called champagne,” I jab.

“Yeah, and since when do we drink that?”

“Hey, alcohol’s alcohol,” says Steve. He knows his stuff. The wrestling boys were always looking for calories, and I remember them joking that drinking a lot was practically nutrition.

He’s about my height, but stockier, like Freddy, and he’s staying in shape by the looks.

“This bubbly shit?”

“Trust the voice of experience,” Steve tells him, swiping his dark blond hair out of his eyes. “You’d be surprised how drinkable it is.”

I watch Ali sipping hers as she stands over there with Susan.

I look at Tommy for his reaction to her, to Susan, and he shrugs lightly. “It was ages ago. I’ve had help forgetting her.” He smiles like the deviant he is.

I reply knowingly, “A lot of help.”

“The more the merrier, right?” Steve suggests, flicking his eyebrows.

I don’t argue, but I mean, he’s wrong. _More_ loses its shine eventually: it’s tiring, if anything, having to learn about a new chick, one after another, even if it’s just enough to please her in the sack, let alone start something together. But some of my friends are still right into it. I say, “Tommy’s gotta sow the wild oats.”

“I do,” he agrees, and he winks before he starts to obviously rate the potential on the patio. If I was looking, I’d rate it extremely high, and among our wider circle, there are even a couple of girls who I, or my friends, already spent that kind of time with, in high school. But it’s not on my radar for tonight, so I pretty much ignore the three or four faces who’ve been smiling at me since I got here, or talking to a friend behind their hand, while they look right at me, or standing with a hand on one hip and pushing out their chest to try to make me look.

I watch the sunset instead, over to our right, over the top of the beach steps. The sky’s lit up with pink and dark yellow. It plays real nice on this side of the house, where it’s all cream, in all the spots it’s not glass, with a light grey roof.

There’s another deck up above us, a proper wooden one on the upper storey, but it’s much smaller than this patio, about half as wide as the house, and it doesn’t come out real far. From my angle I can’t see up onto it. It’s high up; the floors here must be more than twelve feet.

I haven’t been upstairs yet on any previous visit, since we mostly just came through the house and went down to the beach, and I think Jimmy keeps it kinda private, like you only go up there if you get invited to.

I think that’s probably a really good plan to keep going for this party, assuming he doesn’t want this crowd making pretty free up there in whatever room they like. Cos it’s possible it might go that way later, or more than possible.

I am reliably informed by Jimmy there’s a whole bunch more rooms on the upper floor, including a gym where he works out, so I’ll check it out sooner or later.

Since it’s starting to get dark, Jennifer goes and lights some of those beach kind of torches around the edges of the patio, and the house is lit up bright behind us, too. The lights are on in a few houses along the beach, but not many. I guess maybe some of them sit empty during winter, or people just stay inside at night.

Jimmy calls us back inside through the folding doors, and we all follow back into the big room. Standing together, I can see there’s definitely about thirty or so of us, all from our year and Ali’s, the year below, although I’m rusty on one or two names of people I haven’t seen for a couple years.

“Hey guys. Ladies.” Right away he’s throwing up a hand to quiet us down. “I know, I know, no one wants a speech.”

Dutch heckles him, and Jimmy throws him the finger. “Just shut up for one second, if you don’t mind. I promise not long. I just wanted to say to all of you, in case we don’t get to talk... it’s great to have you here. Thank you for coming to my house. I wanted to get all the old gang together, even though I know lots of us have drifted apart.”

Bobby shrugs a question at me. I guess Jimmy didn’t tell him about the speech either. I just shake my head, equally lost.

Jimmy’s pulled Jennifer against his side and puts his arm around her. She’s smiling and looking up at him while he talks. “All of you are my friends, and I - well, me and Jennifer – we wanted to give you the chance to hang out again. We know there’s a whole lotta reasons why we haven’t been, but it doesn’t have to be that way. I’m gonna have another party, on Saturday. And then again on Wednesday. All winter. I wanna see you guys while you’re all back home, so you’re welcome to come as often as you want.”

Some people are exchanging looks with friends, and some are sizing up exes or people they haven’t talked to for a long time. I don’t have the heart to search for Ali’s face, can’t bear the idea of her seeing me do it, so I force myself to keep watching Jimmy instead.

I have no idea if anyone will buy into his idea, but I gotta admire his guts for putting himself out there.

“It’s not gonna be fancy like tonight,” Jimmy’s telling us, and to give him credit, people are certainly listening. “But we can have fun like the old days. New Year’s Eve’s a Wednesday, so we can party all night, then.”

When he’s finished, which ends on a murmur of agreement, not particularly enthusiastic from some people, the five of us find our way together again.

Dutch asks, without any lead in, “Have you cut off your johnson?”

He earns a long-suffering eye roll from Jimmy. I feel compelled to defend our host, for some reason.

I nod at Jimmy. “I actually think that took some balls. Sure, it’s soft chick shit, but to stand up there and say that...”

Tommy looks like it’s against his better judgement, but he agrees, “Shit, you’re right.”

“Ah, whatever, man,” Dutch says dismissively. “Chick shit is right. I doubt anything will change. Some people aren’t worth the effort.”

Jimmy looks steadily at Dutch. “I guess we’ll see.”

“Yeah, we _will_ ,” Dutch says, taking one step as if he’s gonna get in Jimmy’s face. He doesn’t back down, ever, and if this was a real confrontation, he wouldn’t now, either. But he makes this kind of scoff, and slings an arm around Tommy.

“Save me from these guys, will you? Before they try to turn me into a chick, too.”

“Screw you,” I tell him, but without much bite, and I’m glad when Tommy pulls him away somewhere. I hear them start up laughing about something. Bobby’s gone to chat with someone, so Jimmy asks if I want him to show me around.

“Yeah, it’s about time you did.”

“Haha, sorry. Let’s go, then. Upstairs. I think you’ve seen the rest.” I follow him up the stairs, which are in corner of the room, and he’s turning to talk to me as we climb, side by side. “It’s good to see you, Johnny.”

“Likewise. And this place is just great.”

“Right?”

“Oh, sure,” I say, some admiration in my voice.

The stairs lead up to a sunroom with a parquet floor, smaller than the room below, with some wicker chairs you can sink down into, with piles of blankets, neatly folded, and houseplants in pots and hanging from the ceiling. The sunroom has glass doors behind us, opening out onto the upstairs deck. We don’t go that way; Jimmy shows me through some bedrooms off the hallway ahead, and a home gym.

“I’m pretty much living here full time, now,” Jimmy says. “I’m kinda hoping my parents will let my girlfriend move in, but that’s gonna take another year or two, I think.”

“Sounds like it’s going great for you at work.”

“Yup. I wasn’t sold on working in Dad’s company, but it’s not bad, and at least I can earn my own money. It feels good. I pay the bills here, you know.”

“That’s great.”

“I been going to night school. I wanna get a diploma, you know, for my work at the firm. It’ll open up options.”

“You’re doing great, Jimmy. You’re really making something of your life.”

He looks to see if I’m bagging him out, but to my surprise, I’m not. He says, “There would’ve been a time not so long ago you probably would’ve called someone like me a dork, huh? And I would’ve said it about me, too.”

I laugh briefly, because he’s right, but if anything, I’m jealous of how centered he is, and how good he is at being an adult. He’s winning that race out of the five of us, by a longshot.

“Yeah, but we’re all growing up. As long as we still have fun, I’m all for it.”

“And you see, that’s why I wanna have you guys over all winter, okay? I know we try to hang out once or twice a month and all that, but I miss the old days! We never get all of us in the one place.”

I glance around meaningfully. “Yeah, I can see why this life would leave you longing for something else.”

Jimmy grins at me. “I miss you and the guys. I want… shit. I hope you don’t think I’m a girl saying this. I just, I want us to stay friends. Right?”

“We’ll always be friends,” I say simply. One of the most powerful truths of my life.

“For life.”

“For life,” I agree, more firmly.

We’re back at the top of the stairs, in the sunroom. When we glance out over the deck, I notice a figure there in the dark, with her back to us.

“Hey, that looks like Ali out there,” Jimmy says, as if there’s any question about it. “Why don’t you go say hi?”

“I dunno. I doubt she’d want me to.”

“C’mon Johnny. Mend the fences.”

I blow out a breath. “As much as I’d love that, I think those fences were burned, broken up and thrown into the sea, a few years back.”

“Well, suit yourself. I’m heading back downstairs, but if you want my vote, I say give it a shot. The worst that can happen is she tells you to get lost.”

I sigh and mutter, almost to myself, “Yeah, which she probably will…”

Jimmy bumps me with his elbow. “See ya?”

“Thanks.”

I rest my hand on the knob at the top of the stair rail and look through the open door. I can see the outline of her, backlit from the light in here. She’s in a deck chair, and I guess she’s looking out at the night ocean.

I figure, what the hell.

I don’t wanna frighten her, sneaking up in the dark, so I knock lightly on the sliding door.

“Hey,” I say, when she turns in her seat. She’s got her bare feet up, crossed at the ankles, on the railing that runs around the deck.

She’s a bit like a deer in the headlights. “Hey.”

She looks at me, and I can’t remember what I wanted to say.

I kinda hate myself for how much I am looking for a sign of disgust or dislike, how relieved I am when she doesn’t glare at me. I can’t tell _what_ she thinks; that’s all hidden very well away.

After a second or two of me not talking, and her just looking at me, she turns slowly back in her chair to look at the night. There’s some music starting up below us, but not too loud.

I begin, “I, uh, haven’t seen you for ages.”

She nods slightly. “It’s been awhile.”

“Are you – is it okay if I come out there?”

There’s silence, long enough that I regret asking.

Then she says, “It’s a free country.”

“I don’t wanna disturb you or anything.”

She gives me a guarded look, just a glance, and then finally shrugs. “I guess it’s no big deal, as long as you’re not here for trouble.”

“Great. Thanks. I mean, no, no trouble.”

I edge my way over the deck and pull an empty chair to sit a yard or two away from her, facing out to the sea. She watches me sit down, perhaps to make sure I’m not coming too close, I dunno, and then she turns back away.

“How you been keeping, Ali?”

“I’m good.” She’s keeping her voice very even. “I’m going to Stanford.”

“Oh yeah?” I ask, even though I heard that rumor already. “No more high school, huh.”

“Thank god. Senior year wasn’t the greatest, but now things are good.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

I get a brief pointed look with her eyebrows raised at me, kinda sarcastic, for this, so I smile. “What?”

I see a flicker of annoyance, impatience. It’s probably sick, but it makes me smile more, because I used to get that a lot, and I don’t hate it.

She asks, and it’s kinda snippy, “What are you doing out here?”

I shrug slightly, and run my fingers through my hair. “I dunno. Wanted to say hi, see how you’re doing and all that.” Because I’ve missed you, of course. Words I’ll never say.

From the side, I can see her puzzled frown. “I’m not sure why.”

“I know we’re ancient history now, but I can still care about how things are going for you, can’t I, Ali? Isn’t that the point of what Jimmy’s doing here? Giving us all the chance to get over some of the things that happened in eighty-four, and be friends again?”

She frowns again and then turns to me. “I don’t think I can be friends with you.”

I tell myself that doesn’t hurt to hear, but it does, of course. It’s brutal, more so because I know I deserve it.

I steady myself with a breath. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about that until you want to, or ever. That’s up to you. But would you be willing to give me one chance?”

She quickly shakes her head. “I gave you a lotta chances, Johnny. Too many.”

“I know that. I’m not talking about that kinda chance. I mean, one chance to be, if not friends, then at least be civil to each other.”

“I feel like I’m being pretty civil.”

“Right. And it’s going okay so far, right?”

I see her pressing her lips together, but I haven’t forgotten what her face looks like when she hides a smile.

“So far,” she agrees.

“There you go. You got nothing to worry about.”

“Fine, whatever.”

I relax a little, having cleared one hurdle. There could be hundreds to go, I have no idea. I do know she won’t go easy on me; she never did.

I fidget with my thumbs for a minute, deciding I’d better not look across at her too much like some creep.

She asks, “So how about you, Johnny? I remember Susan telling me you dropped out. She still gets the gossip from your gang somehow, even though I know she never gives Tommy the time of day.”

“That chick sure knows how to hold a grudge.”

“Yeah well, he was her first boyfriend. That takes a while to get over.”

Another silence, this time solid as a brick, stretches between us. I have no idea whether she means me or her, but I guess it has to be me, because it sure didn’t seem that way for her.

“So?” she asks eventually. “You’re not going to college anymore?”

I’m glad the darkness will hide my shame, and I bite the inside of my cheek. “I did drop out. I’ve gone back, though.”

“Oh yeah?” she asks, and she actually sounds a bit interested.

“Yeah. I kinda have to. So I’m behind now, but I’m trying to catch up.”

“You doing holiday classes?”

I smile sheepishly. “Does that seem like something I’d do?”

“Well, you said you’re trying to catch up.”

“Yeah, sure, but I have limits. I’ll make it right, it’s gonna be alright, eventually, it has to be. I’ll get there. I’ve gotta find a way to make my own way, so I can get out from having to live with…” I trail off, because she knows who I mean.

Ali leans back into her chair a bit, slides down so her head is resting on the back, although she still talks mostly at the rail, and not to my face. “That asshole is still around, huh?”

“Yup. I keep wondering if he’ll do me a favor and have a heart attack, but no luck. I don’t spend much time there. No more than I have to.”

Ali sighs. “I’m lucky. I like being away from home, and I’m in love with San Francisco, but coming back in the holidays, it’s been really nice to see my parents. I’m sorry you don’t have that.”

I guess that’s the nicest thing she’s said to me so far, and I feel like I must be doing a pretty great job. “I’ve got my mom, at least.”

“Yeah. How’s she doing?”

“She’s fine. The usual, although she doesn’t try to hide how unhappy she is, now that I’m older.”

Ali shakes her head. “Poor Laura. She was always really nice to me. I wish she’d – I wish she’d just leave him.”

“You and me both. I’ll never understand relationships.”

I study Ali for a moment, and then say, “I don’t like the way you’re smiling. I feel like that might be an attack on me.”

She chuckles and covers her mouth, embarrassed, kinda awkward. “I’m sorry, Johnny. I couldn’t help it. I’m just thinking back to what a mess it was with us.”

I swallow a lump in my throat, and don’t say anything for a moment. I wish she didn’t have to make light of it; I don’t remember it being funny.

“It wasn’t like that the whole time.”

“No,” she agrees reluctantly.

There’s a whole bunch of things I could say next. And about a thousand apologies and questions I’d like to say, but something warns me not to. One wrong move, and our conversation will be over.

“So, are you seeing anyone now?”

She sighs tiredly, even though I didn’t mean it like that, just said it because it seemed like a logical follow-on. “And there’s the question I was really hoping you wouldn’t ask.”

“Okay, I’m sorry. You’re right. It’s none of my business.”

“No it isn’t. But it’s not just that.”

“What?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “You can’t – if you wanna try to be friends, and I’m still not sure if that’s possible, realistically, you can’t start hitting on me.”

I turn toward her. “I didn’t hit on you!”

“I’m serious. It’s exhausting, and I’m not in the mood. I haven’t forgotten how you wore me down into going out with you on a date in the first place. That isn’t going to happen now, so don’t waste both our time.”

Ali was always able to land hits on my ego, and tonight is no exception, even if what she’s saying isn’t what I was doing. “Read my lips. I didn’t mean it that way. Can you – can you please believe me, for once?”

She looks at me, annoyed. That crease between her brows has appeared. “Have you forgotten how well I know you?”

“Hey, I’ve changed.”

“Maybe. Maybe you have, how would I know?”

I watch her steadily. “I guess you’ll have to find out by letting me show you.”

“I don’t _have_ to do anything.”

I sink a little. “No, you’re right. But I promise, I wasn’t. Hitting on you. And I promise I won’t.”

She smiles wryly. “Because you’re really well known for being friends with girls with no ulterior motive, right?”

“Shit, can you give me even a little break? Let me show you I’m different, now. I’ve grown up. Well, I’m trying my best to.”

Ali just huffs out this disbelieving sound. “So you’ve said. And?”

“And, maybe now I can be friends with a chick. Especially one that I happen to like, because she’s cool, like you. Don’t you remember how well we used to get along?”

She goes a bit quiet then, like her spikes go back in. She says, uncertainly, “Johnny, it’s hard for me to trust you. After… everything.”

“I get that. I can be patient.”

She looks at me with wide eyes. “Since when?”

I laugh unwillingly, and then remind myself I’m not supposed to be staring at her. I look out at the sky, lit grey by the city lights. “See, you’re learning already.”

I realise I have scored, or at least potentially scored, some major points, so I follow it up with the killing blow.

I stand up. “Hey, it was great to see you. I’m gonna head back downstairs, and leave you to your ocean gazing.”

Yes! I can see she’s puzzled with me not pushing, the way I once would have, and I congratulate myself for how this went. I’ve given myself the best shot I can for her to let me talk to her again.

“Alright,” she says, after a moment. “Maybe I’ll see you, then.”

“You will, if you’re coming to Jimmy’s parties. He’s made me promise to. He’ll kill me otherwise.”

“Okay,” she says with a smile, but she’s not looking at me. “Funny. Jennifer said a similar thing to me.”

“Night, Ali.”

“Good night.”

*

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Each party will be in one or two chapters, depending on length.
> 
> Thanks for reading. I'd love to hear what you think of the beginning :3


	2. Saturday 1: Memories

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading and thank you to KingKarate and MandyJ for leaving me your thoughts :) It is SOOO appreciated!

Saturday doesn’t take long to come.

At the next party, the two main groups, ours and Ali’s, pretty much keep to themselves again, although some of the more outer circle people, like Jennifer, like Steve and some others, are able to cross over and talk to nearly everyone.

When I glance at Ali when I’m walking past the sofa, she looks away, which I take as a message that I shouldn’t talk to her, so I don’t. She’s with Susan and Barbara, and Connie, and a few girls, and they are all talking to Aaron. Ali’s next to him, and they are all sitting around him like he’s some kind of king. He’s this kid with white blond hair, on the skinny side, but the girls don’t seem to mind.

Bobby got shot down, earlier. I think he wanted us to bury him in the sand for a while, but then he decided to get drinking with Steve and Josh, which seems to have helped his recovery.

All he tried to do was talk to her, to Barbara, when they passed in the hallway.

“Hi Barbara,” said his voice, and she turned around and crossed her arms and stared at him like he was an insect.

Like, she didn’t even say a word. Just waited until he limped back to us to lick his wounds.

I directed Dutch to bring him a drink, and that got him started down that path. Can’t see that she’s worth the hassle, myself, but I’d never say that to my friend.

Other than that, everyone’s having a great time, I guess, but I’ve seen Jimmy looking at the group of girls and guys on the sofas, and at the four of us out here on the patio again, with a few other guys, and the girls from our year mingling around the edges, and I know he’s bummed out.

I coulda told him it was a longshot.

It gets dark, and I haven’t seen Ali for a while. She disappeared from the group in there, who I can see through the glass from where we are, and she’s been gone awhile.

It occurs to me to wonder, if maybe. Just maybe.

I’ll look like an idiot if she’s not up there, and she sees me go looking for her. But weighed against the chance she might be willing to have another talk under cover of darkness and privacy, it seems worth the risk.

I excuse myself and make my way up, as casually as I can.

When I see her in the same place, I smile at her back for a few seconds, and then make sure I’m looking pretty neutral when I sit down next to her.

“There must be something special about this spot,” I say. “But I’m damned if I can work out what.”

I see the slightest movement of her lips, not quite a smile. “Hey, it’s quiet up here. Or at least it _was.”_

“Mm, quiet. Just what you’d be looking for at a party.”

“I need a break, sometimes,” she says, looking across at me. “Don’t you?”

I shrug, considering. “Not really. Although, maybe yeah. It can be nice to get away, I guess.”

“There you go.”

“I have a feeling Jimmy’s idea isn’t gonna work out,” I say.

“Yeah, no shit.”

“He’s gonna be disappointed. He’s got this hopeful streak in him. It’s real annoying. We tried to beat it out of him, but no luck.”

Ali shakes her head at her lap, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. There’s a little breeze tonight, but it’s not cold, and it’s ruffling her hair a little, making it look soft. She says, “Things are going well with him and Jennifer.”

“Sure seems that way.”

“What was with Bobby before? He was trying to tease one of my friends.”

“Who? Barbara?”

“Yup. Did you see what happened? She didn’t really tell me.”

I breathe a heavy sigh. “Yeah, I saw. It wasn’t teasing. And I can’t say anything more without being shitty to my friend.”

Ali turns bodily in the seat and stares at me, confused. “Say that again, slowly. I’m gonna see if any of it makes sense.”

I groan quietly and push a fist against my forehead. I can’t betray him. Never that.

“She was mistaken. He was just being polite, but she took it the wrong way. I promise you. I saw it, and I have no reason to lie.”

“Except to protect your friend, you mean,” she suggests. She stretches and slips her shoes off, those white ones again, and she lifts her small feet up on the rail. Back in the day, I always thought they were cute, prettier than feet have a right to be.

“Think about it. Would I bother to protect Bobby about supposedly teasing her? Why would it matter?”

“There’s something you’re not saying.”

“You’re correct.” I guess she really does know me as well as she says.

“Hey,” I hear Tommy saying from downstairs, to someone else, pretty loudly. It’s a nice diversion. “Let’s go for a walk along the beach! Who’s up for it?”

I hear some voices calling agreement, including Dutch, who then says, “Hey, where’s Johnny at?”

“Shit,” I say, with a short laugh. “Guess I’d better go, before they come up looking for me.”

Ali nods once at me when I get up, and I’m pretty disappointed we got cut short before I could make any progress.

“You gonna come down?”

“Yeah, maybe. You go. I don’t want my friends to see us come downstairs together.”

“Sure.”

I wait for a goodbye, but she won’t look at me. “Go,” she says, and she’s getting bossy.

I smile, at least a little content, because Ali bossing me around, or even trying to, is another thing I don’t hate.

Basically, it used to be foreplay for us, or it became that. And even though there’s nothing sexual going on, apparently I still have my old automatic response of really enjoying it.

I head inside, and down the stairs.

A few people are loitering near the top of the outside steps, the ones to the beach, but my friends are in a big group on the patio.

Bobby grins at me, and comes up to put a hand on my shoulder. “There you are.” He’s real drunk, which I can tell from the dazed look in his eyes and that stupid grin he always has when he’s not sober. “We thought you must be off somewhere with a chick.”

“You must have me confused with Dutch,” I reply, earning a proud, slightly disturbing chuckle from my most insane friend.

“The night is young,” Dutch tells me with a flick of his eyebrows.

“And I’m wondering why you aren’t wearing a shirt.”

Dutch looks down at his bare chest with a grin, but before he can explain, Tommy shouts at us from halfway across the patio.

“Come the fuck _on_.” He’s gesturing with both hands that we should follow him, and he’s already backing toward the steps; the whole group is moving now. It looks like just about everyone’s gonna go for a walk together.

“Keep your panties on,” Dutch yells back.

Bobby joins in, “Yeah, Dutch is gonna want to take them off later, when you’re all alone.”

Tommy flips him off with both hands and turns away, and I hear Bobby’s ‘oof’ from Dutch’s punch, which he does deserve.

We all tramp down the steps.

Some people kick their shoes off, a few girls try to come alongside us, but when we catch up to Tommy, I make sure I’ve got him and Dutch flanking me, since Bobby drops back behind. We’re all heading after whoever’s in the lead up there, going left, up the beach.

Ali’s group is in front of us, and one of the guys, Greg, has a soccer ball, which he’s dribbling while we walk. He’s a jock, a pretty strong guy, although not huge, with fairly dark brown hair and a dark tan, and he’s best friends with Aaron. They break away with a couple of others to start kicking the ball, running alongside the big group to chase it on the sand. It brings a painful memory into sharp focus for a second, as I stare at Ali’s back, but I’m distracted when Dutch props his arm up on my shoulder in that way he always does.

I don’t mind it, because the thing is, when you know where Dutch is, you’ve already won half the battle. His ability to cause trouble is a lot less.

“Where are we going?” someone calls out from behind me.

“Who the fuck knows?” Bobby shouts back. I see him over there, and he’s walking in between Courtney and Samantha, two blonde girls who hang around with Steve a lot.

One of them loops her arm into Bobby’s, laughing, and I wonder if the flirting might help him out to get over his issue. I can hope.

The ball goes Ali’s way, and I see her scoop it up, and do that thing with it on her knees, one, two, three, on the spot, before she drops it.

She reaches down to grab it, and she’s chatting about something with one of those friends of hers, though she’s still got the ball, and she whirls around to face me, and walks backwards for a few steps.

Before I know it, the ball lands hard against me, in my stomach, nearly winding me, although not quite. I just manage to catch it, well before she smirks at me and says, “Think fast.”

I see a disparaging look from one of those stupid friends of hers, but Ali’s already turned back to her, so I figure whatshername can go to hell.

I kick it back to Aaron and Greg, and they take off running up the beach again.

“What?” I say, when I notice Tommy and Dutch looking at each other, across me.

“So, we’re doing this again?” Dutch asks in disbelief.

“Nah,” says Tommy, and I guess I should thank him for at least keeping his voice down. “She won’t give him the time of day.” He doesn’t say this in a shitty way, and I’m reminded that when it counts, Tommy’s become quite a good friend.

“Stupid litt-” Dutch begins, but I cut him off.

“Nope.”

He rolls his eyes dramatically, and gives me a shove, finally disengaging from me. “You’re whipped, man. Like fucking _cream_.”

“Get fucked.”

He smiles arrogantly. “I probably will, later tonight, but how is that relevant?”

“Shut your mouth,” I say, just a little warningly, and that’s enough for him to take off again.

I swear, he’s the biggest drama queen I’ve ever met.

“Suit yourself,” he tells me. “C’mon, Tommy, how 'bout a swim?”

“Well, gee, Dutch, it’s winter, and it’s night time. How about not?”

“C’mon, the water’s still warm.”

To my vague horror, and Tommy’s amusement, Dutch is pulling everything down – jeans, boxers - and stepping out of them in the sand.

There’s a flash of oddly tanned skin, although maybe it isn’t odd when you consider this is Dutch, and then he’s running into the water.

Everyone slows down, and starts either laughing or cheering him on, which was exactly what he wanted, I’m sure.

“No takers?” he calls back at us. He stands up, and anyone who wants to look gets a real eyeful. I hear a lot of the guys egging him on, and there are some whistles.

“Oh my god,” I hear Susan saying. “What is _with_ that guy?” As if she didn’t used to hang out with him, as if she’s forgotten what Dutch has always been like.

“Such an idiot,” says one of the other bitchy voices, but I notice the girl on the end, with a jacket on, is quite happy to look at Dutch, even turning to watch him when she walks by.

*

When we get back to the house maybe an hour later, we’re still all in a group, and we head into the big room before it occurs to anyone to split back up.

Jimmy’s put some background music on, and he comes to sit down with me and Bobby on the sofas.

Everyone else is sitting or standing around, some of them leaning against the back of the chairs to talk to someone, but there’s no denying this is the least divided the group has been.

Bobby must have slowed the drinking down, maybe due to the beach walk, because he’s pretty with it, now.

“What’d you think of the show?” he asks Jimmy, and they cackle together.

“Poor guy didn’t realise it was so cold, I guess,” Steve says from behind us, and this sets even me going, even though it’s not super accurate.

Samantha comes and sits down next to Bobby. He makes room for her, but I read him well enough to see he’s not real into it, even though she’s a total babe, basically the model they used to make Barbie dolls. I’m gonna need to talk to him sometime, snap him out of it, because I remember that Samantha has always been very picky, but once she has chosen, she’s a friendly girl, who makes it worth your while.

“How ‘bout you, Johnny?” Jimmy asks me. “Enjoying talking to some of the old crew?”

“It’s great.”

Jimmy gives me this small smile that may or may not have a meaning, so I look away, and accidentally meet Barbara’s eyes.

Somehow, I know I just missed catching her looking at Bobby, who now has Samantha whispering in his ear, and sliding her hand over his knee.

She glares at me for less than a second, and then ignores us for the rest of the night.


	3. Wednesday 2: Remember When

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A note for the Dutch lovers: Ali and her friends really make a show of how much they don’t like him these days, huh??? I wonder why that could be?
> 
> (no, I’m NOT signally forthcoming or unrequited Ali and Dutch, just pointing out that some of them make a big deal about how _not_ desirable he is. A wayyy big deal.)

When we get together on Wednesday, it’s some of the same group, or most of them. There’s a few I remember seeing the first night, too. We all start hanging out in the big room, but still with two noticeable sides. We’ve got bowls of popcorn, and the round coffee table inside the semicircle of sofas is already pretty full of glasses and empty beer bottles.

Jennifer, fittingly, is sitting in pretty much the dead center seat, between the groups, with a space next to her for Jimmy, who’s off doing something.

“We should play a game,” she says, and it’s not really to anyone in particular, but maybe to Ali’s group if I had to say someone.

Tommy’s sitting up on the back edge of the couch with his feet down on the seat, next to me. He’s been chatting up this brunette chick, Erin, from our year, and she’s sitting up the top too, next to him, but facing the other way, with her legs hanging down over the back.

I hear Tommy say to her, “We could play spin the bottle.”

“We’re not twelve,” Jimmy says, sinking back into his seat, and Tommy reaches into the nearest bowl of popcorn and throws some at him.

“You better clean that up,” Jimmy says, but he’s already turning to listen to Susan, who just laughed in that way girls do when you know they’re gonna say something really sarcastic.

She’s looking at Tommy, her eyes narrowed. “Besides, there’s some people here I wouldn’t want to kiss. It’d be a public health risk.”

Bobby laughs, and me, and Tommy shoots us a look of betrayal, even though we aren’t the only ones, and then says smugly to Susan, “Didn’t used to bother you.”

They stare at each other for a few seconds, and someone makes a teasing sound, like a drawn out ‘woo’.

I see her cheeks flush, and she grits out, “Yeah - well, we all make mistakes.”

“Ooh!” says Tommy, covering his heart with both hands in mockery. “Please, I can’t take any more.”

I see Jimmy’s face fall, and I wonder if finally we might be able to break his spirit, bring him back down to our level, so he can stop showing us up all the time.

The world’s a shitty place, my friend, and you gotta stop hoping for rainbows.

Jennifer still rallies, and I identify her as a source of the troubling optimism. Makes sense.

“How about we just chat?” she suggests. “I’ve got this memory from school. It’s about you, Bobby.”

He looks a little taken aback, but he turns to her. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She smiles. I suppose she’s fairly pretty, with those brown eyes and light brown hair, although a little too sweet and innocent for my taste. “You remember that time when I was at cheer practice, and you guys were out on the field?”

“Oh shit!” Bobby says in dawning comprehension.

Jennifer nods meaningfully. “We were doing a climb. This kind of pyramid. I was on the third layer, but the girl below me moved and lost her balance, and I started to fall.”

“I remember,” Bobby says, blowing out a breath that moves his hair.

Jennifer looks around at a few people and then back to Bobby. “This kid caught me somehow, and I’ll tell you it was like some superman shit. Came outta nowhere, just waiting there with his arms underneath me.”

She’s got some nerve calling an older guy a kid, but Bobby’s biting back a smile when a couple people near him clap him on the back. I can tell he’s enjoying it.

“It was nothing.”

“Hardly,” Jennifer insists. “I could’ve broke my neck if you weren’t there.”

“I don’t remember that,” Jimmy says, frowning at her. “Hey, you’ve never told me about that.”

He looks a question at Bobby, who replies in what I know he believes is his cool voice. “What? It was no big deal, I’m telling you.”

People are lapping it up, the humble guy act, and I can’t even tell how deliberately he’s doing it. He’s Mr Smooth, for sure.

Jimmy picks up Jennifer’s hand and draws it into his lap, and says to Bobby, “Guess I owe you my thanks, my friend.”

“Anytime,” Bobby tells him with a grin.

Jennifer’s managed to get the room’s attention, like she wanted, and now she says to Bobby, “Your turn.”

“Oh, I dunno,” he says, with a shrug, but everyone’s looking at him, so he pushes himself back onto the sofa cushion behind him. “Oh, fine. Lemme think.”

He plays it smart and chooses someone neutral, like I would.

“Josh.”

“Yeah?” the redhead replies from the other side of the room. He’s been talking to Steve and Greg over there, behind Ali’s group.

He’s this lanky guy with freckles, but he’s really funny, and everyone likes him.

“Remember sophomore year, when we started getting high during shop?”

“Sounds like a great decision,” Jimmy says, but everyone is laughing.

Josh is smiling widely. “How could I forget? That was the best. And that dumb teacher, what was his name?”

“Mr Peters.”

“Right, Peters used to come up and ask us what that smell was.”

Bobby is stifling laughter. “You used to say you thought there might be something wrong with the bandsaw, or some other machine.”

“And he bought it every time.” They are proud of their story, and I’m the opposite of surprised to see Barbara’s lip curl in disapproval.

Josh takes it into Ali’s group next. I watch, and try not to roll my eyes, as Susan is her typical uptight self when she answers her question. Seriously, how does Ali hang around with them? I feel like they’ve gotten real sure of themselves, that they’re above everyone here.

Thank god, she doesn’t go for Tommy, which I half thought she might just to try to embarrass him with something.

Sooner or later someone is asking Ali a question about something from biology. After that, it’s her turn, and I will her to look at me, ask me, even though I also fear it.

But it’s Jimmy she speaks to. “Certain unpleasant sights on Saturday have brought back to my mind that day we all went to Knott’s, and you lost your bathing suit on the waterslide.”

Jimmy’s weak ‘Gee, thanks, Ali,’ is lost in Dutch’s overruling, “Hey, you take that back.”

I wasn’t sure he was even in the room, he’s been so quiet, but he’s back there behind me.

“Yeah, like you’ll make me,” Ali says dismissively, and I look up and try to shoot Dutch a pleading glance of: not now, please.

Dutch just smirks across the room. “Hey, not my fault if you don’t want to admit you liked what you saw. I get it. It can be embarrassing.”

This gets enough people laughing that I relax again.

“My poor baby,” Jennifer coos at Jimmy, but she’s sliding her hand suggestively up Jimmy’s leg, which gets a few cheers and reinvigorates his ego, I’m sure.

Eventually it comes to me, and I’ve had enough time to think of something that means I can talk to Ali, but with something not just about her and me. I’m hoping it won’t make her angry with me, talking to her in front of everyone. I’m reasonably sure there’s enough cover of other people talking across the groups for it to be okay.

“Remember that picnic?” I ask, my eyes on her. “When we all went for a ride up into the hills?”

I look at a few other faces who were there, some guys, and Ali’s least bitchy friend, the one who was looking at Dutch when he skinny dipped, before focussing back on Ali.

She’s looking a little worried about what I might say, but she nods and takes up playing with the knee of her jeans.

“You were on the back of my bike,” I explain. “We were all riding up, maybe ten bikes in a row. We had lunch with us, and all the required refreshments.

A few people are nodding and smiling at me.

I say to Ali. “And you were supposed to be carrying the beers.”

I see her shoulders lift with a small laugh, and then she looks up at me pointedly. “All while holding onto you, right?”

“Hey, it made sense at the time.”

She glances around at everyone. “It will shock you all to hear that those beers never made it. I dropped them on the Canyon Road somewhere, and sadly that was the end of them.”

“Tragic,” I agree.

“I maintain that it wasn’t my fault, and I always will,” Ali declares.

She moves her question onto someone else, but I see her look my way once or twice during the game.

The thought flashes though my mind of what else happened just off the Canyon Road that day, when no one else was around but me and Ali, but I decide not to dwell on it.

*  
The game wraps up after some time, and I have to give credit where it’s due, for it has definitely softened the room. Certain ice walls are unbreakable, such as the Susan/Tommy one, and apparently the one Barbara is throwing Bobby’s way, but those girls both talked to Jimmy quite a bit, and shockingly, Barbara made a small comment about a story I was telling later, about something she was at, this night at Golf’n’Stuff. And Ali actually talked to Bobby and Tommy, even if she stayed pretty snippy with Dutch. I understand it can be a natural reaction to my friend, and he seems to take it as a compliment, anyway.

He found someone, a chick, to go off with, and Tommy and Erin are missing in action too, and another couple or two make their way away together. But most of the rest of us are still chatting and pouring drinks. I can’t deny everyone here’s in a good mood. Some of the stories were fucking funny, but mostly we’ve all been reminded of good times when we didn’t hate each other, and you gotta have a heart of stone for that not to have some effect.

I can see Jimmy’s pleased with himself, and he lets Jennifer drag him out to the patio so they can be by themselves.

A little while later, they’re gone too, and I start to feel like I’m letting the team down, big time, tonight.

But when I hear Susan asking if anyone’s seen Ali, and Connie’s reply that she’s probably just off for some peace, my ears perk up.

“You know what she’s like,” Connie says. “She’ll be back soon enough.”

Well, shit, I hope it’s only _peace_ she’s gone off for, and not something _else_ , which I admit is possible. Nah, not her style. I hope.

Dutch comes back after a while, with a new bottle of beer, when Aaron and Greg are sitting with us. We’ve been chatting. I noticed just before that Susan has a thing for Aaron, I think, although I woulda thought he was on the scrawny side. Those guys are okay, I guess, although I never knew them heaps well, cos they were younger. We all fell into talking about soccer, and the team Bobby’s on, before Dutch sat down and steered us back to the car, his baby, again, for his new audience.

I try not to think about the exact details of what caused that sly happy look he’s wearing, even though he may decide to fill me in anyway, if he’s in the mood.

I feel like I’ve waited enough time for my absence not to be connected to Ali’s, and I head casually upstairs.

*

This time, Ali’s standing up and leaning on the railing. It’s pretty still tonight, and warmer than it has been. When I come next to her, I catch just a little scent like flowers, different to the perfume she used to wear.

“What did you think of all that?” I ask.

“I think Jennifer’s a smart girl.”

“Sure is. I’m real happy for Jimmy, finding her.”

She gives me a brief, but warning look. “She wasn’t lost, and he better treat her right.”

I look down at the empty patio below. I can still hear voices from inside, from the group, and I think I can hear someone giggling on the beach, which I try to block out, because that may be a situation with one of my friends, and I should not have to hear that.

“Jimmy’s pretty far gone,” I admit, after deciding whether I should part with that information. “He’s got it real bad. No way in hell will he hurt her now.”

Ali raises her eyebrows, possibly unconvinced that that alone will do the trick, which I think she’s aiming at me personally, but I pretend I didn’t get that.

“You know him,” I continue. “He was always the voice of reason among us. He’s on the straight and narrow for real, now. His days of fooling around are behind him.”

“I guess time will tell if that sets an example for _Dutch_ ,” she says, pretending to consider the possibility.

“Not one chance in hell,” I assure her. “He’s never gonna change. He never looks at the same face twice.”

“Yeah well,” Ali says snidely, “maybe the girl doesn’t want to look at his face again, either. Can’t say I’d blame her.”

I smile. The old antagonism between the two of them is as familiar as a blanket. It comforts me, somehow, to experience it again.

Then she lets out this frustrated sound. “Fine,” she says, I think saying to herself. “I’m probably gonna regret telling you this. Can you promise me you can keep a secret?”

“Of course.”

She starts with this impression of a disappointed parent, or teacher, shaking her head slowly back and forth, and frowning dramatically.

“So, one of my friends has a crush on him.”

I laugh and then cover my mouth, because she looks at me, really annoyed.

“Sorry. On _Dutch?_ ” Obviously I can't be sure, but I don't think he's the kind of guy that girls have crushes on; it’s always something much more physical than that, from what I see, and it only lasts pretty much as long as it needs to.

She nods and rolls her eyes. “Trust me, I _know_. She might have brain damage, I’m gonna get her checked.”

I say, a little suggestively, but not so much I think I’ll get in trouble, “Don’t tell me it was his stunt on the beach the other night?”

Ali pretends a look like she may vomit. “No, it started before that, and that should have _ended_ it, if anything.” She pauses to glare at me, as if I am somehow responsible for the skinny dipping, but I can’t help laughing, which makes her tighten her lips more.

She goes on, “I guess she liked what she saw. Gross. She keeps going on about him, now, and it’s driving me crazy. Susan and Barbara are all for cutting her off. You know what they think of him.”

“Yes, I think the whole world knows. But… holy fuck,” I say, unable to work out how a chick with a stick up her ass could possibly find anything to like about my friend. “Hey, wait. Which one of your friends are you talking about?”

“Tina.”

“Which one’s that?”

Ali looks as me with disdain. “Seriously? You spent a year, more, talking to my friends, and you still don’t know which is which?”

“Hey,” I say defensively. “I know most of them. Is Tina the one with long brown hair?”

I wanna say ‘curvy’, but I somehow stop myself in time. I’m learning.

“That’s the one. She has glasses, and she wears that leather jacket most of the time.”

“Right. Hey, I remember she liked the bikes. She had one.”

Ali gives me a look that there might be some hope for me after all, and I am grateful for that little memory I had before.

“Yeah,” she agrees, “That’s right. Anyway. So?”

“So…?” I ask, confused.

“So, what do you think I mean? Does she have a shot?”

I screw my face up and run my hands through my hair, playing for time.

It doesn’t work, and Ali goes off on me. “Oh, that’s lovely! The man will sleep with anything that moves, but she’s not good enough?”

“It’s not that,” I say quickly. “Ugh… look. Dutch is a shallow guy, alright?”

“So you’re agreeing with me. She’s not attractive enough?”

“I have no idea, but he goes for the girls who, you know, well. They put, you know, _it_ , out there for anyone to see. You know, they wear make-up, and they do their hair and all that. Believe me, he pretty much has his pick as soon as he decides he wants to score.”

“They wear make-up,” Ali repeats and gives me a strange look. “Clueless, all of you.”

I can’t make out her meaning, but what I meant was girls who have to put all that on to get attention, because they don’t look like Ali does right from the start. I think I might not say that to clarify.

“So you’re telling me, if Tina puts on a miniskirt and some more hairspray, maybe she’ll get him in the sack?”

“I’m sorry,” I offer, but Ali’s on a roll now.

“And what about her glasses? Does Dutch date many girls with glasses?”

I can’t do anything except shake my head slightly, a hollow feeling inside me when I’m forced to think about how we used to see girls, the way Dutch still does see them.

“I suppose she can take them off,” Ali suggests bitterly. “Hope she can see well enough not to trip over anything.”

“I’m not saying it’s right,” I say meekly. “But you asked.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I wish I hadn’t.”

“I’m sorry I’ve made you angry.”

She studies me for a minute after that, and then leans back onto the railing with her elbows.

I shove my hands in my pockets while I think, staring out ahead. “Does she just wanna get laid?” I ask.

“Wow, what a classy question.”

“No,” I say quickly, “I mean, is this a one and done, for her? She doesn’t like, want to be with him long term, or anything?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well, it’s just that Dutch doesn’t really do that, you know. So if that’s what she wanted, it’d be hopeless.”

Ali sighs dully. “You said it’s hopeless anyway. Maybe we should just drop it.”

I walk up next to her, and rest my arms on the rail. This is the closest I’ve dared to stand, a bit less than a yard, but I get away with it.

“Can we do a trade?”

“A what?”

“A trade.”

Here goes. I’m sorry, Bobby. I really hope I’m doing the right thing now.

“Believe it or not, one of my friends has a crush, too.”

She gives a surprised laugh. “Well, depending on which friend, and on who, I don’t like their chances.” She looks at me quickly. “It’s not Dutch, right?”

“No,” I admit reluctantly, and we both know the problem with that is, that now I either mean Tommy or Bobby, since it obviously isn’t Jimmy.

“Ali, you won’t say anything? You promise?”

“Not if you don’t, about Tina.”

“Alright, fine. Well, I thought you were gonna work it out, anyway, last time we talked. Seemed like you were about to.”

She thinks for a moment, and then she says, staring at me, “Oh no.”

“Oh yes,” I confirm.

“Tell him to forget it.”

I’m pretty offended on Bobby’s behalf at the total dismissal, because he’s the one out of Barbara’s league, if anything, not the other way around, but I try to sound reasonable. “How come?”

“She really doesn’t like him.”

“Because?”

“Well, I don’t know all the reasons, but I know that one of them is because of all the stuff with… Daniel.”

I feel a surge of annoyance at his name, especially from her lips.

“Well, why? She managed to talk to me, just now, if you didn’t notice.”

Meaning, I was a lot more central in that issue than Bobby, who was only involved because of me, in the first place.

“Well, as much as she hated Daniel at the start, she ended up thinking he was alright. So therefore, she was very angry with Bobby about the semi-final, because he injured Daniel so bad, because he cheated for Cobra Kai. You might remember that she and Susan didn’t drop you guys just because you and I broke up. It wasn’t until much later, and the tournament pretty much sealed it, finally. Barbara’s got what you might call a moral streak, like an eye for an eye person, about some things. Of course,” she goes on with a smirk, “She went back to hating Daniel when we broke up.”

“Loyal friend,” I comment. “And still hates Bobby, too?”

“I guess. I dunno, seems that way.”

I nod. “So he’s fucked, then, and that’s pretty unfair. Surely you know how many times he tried to apologise to that twerp, and what’s that got to do with Barbara, anyway?”

“You don’t need to call him names.”

And you don’t need to defend him. It’s a struggle not to snap and say that, but I manage instead, “Okay, well, that came out by accident. I’ll try not to. For you.”

“Don’t do me any favors.”

“How ‘bout if I want to?”

“Then tell me how to get Dutch to notice Tina.”

“Well, it depends if we want him to notice she’s a girl, or if we want him to notice that that girl is a person, and not just a warm body. Which, if I’m honest, I’m not sure he knows _how_ to do, with a few exceptions, like you. But yeah, those are two _very_ different things. What’s the goal?”

“Can we do both at the same time?”

“I don’t think we can do either, but I’m happy to give it a try, if you understand it’s gonna fail.” I see her eyes sparkle for a second when I’m looking down at her, but I guess that’s just a trick of the moonlight. “So, we’re just gonna play matchmaker, huh?”

Ali turns away and smiles to herself. “No, we aren’t choosing their matches, they are. We’re just trying to be good friends, right?”

“For hopeless cases,” I remind her.

“Right, but it’s not like you to back down from a challenge, Johnny?”

I peer across at her. “That’s a low blow.”

“I know,” she says smugly.

I make a helpless gesture with my hands turned up, cos I really got nothing. “I don’t wanna suggest Tina should change the way she looks. That’s shitty, and I’m sure she shouldn’t have to, even if it might help. What’s she – what’s she into?”

“Well, heavy music, and like I said, bikes, and I know she likes roller skating and can skateboard. She’s got a bad boy thing, which explains everything we’re talking about here.”

“Funny, she doesn’t look like a rebel.”

“You think she’s a nerd just because she wears glasses.” Again I’m being judged for that, and maybe that’s fair, but it’s still annoying. I’m trying to be better, I really am. “I’m telling you,” Ali says, “she’s great fun. She even worries me sometimes; she’s kinda like our own Dutch, if we had one, but nowhere near as bad as he is.”

“The only thing you’ve said that’s at all promising, is the bikes. You think she’d like his car?”

“How should I know?”

“Well, Dutch will talk to anyone about it for as long as they’ll listen. That’s her in.”

Ali looks disbelieving. “That simple?”

“It’s that or nothing. I can’t make any promises.”

“Okay, thanks.”

“And this didn’t come from me, especially if it blows up in her face.”

“Okay, Johnny.”

“Now, my turn,” I say. “Give and take. So what’s it gonna be?”

Ali blows out a breath. “It’s really tough, honestly. She thinks Bobby’s a bad boy, and unlike Tina, that turns her off him, totally.”

“Should he keep trying to talk to her? Is there anything he could do?”

“I’m still trying to think. And I’m not sure it’s right, I’m not sure I should do that to her.”

“Hey, that’s not fair. I told you about Dutch.”

“Yes, which at worst will result in him having sex with someone who wants to. Big deal. This is not the same, I’m guessing.”

I nod. “No. I don’t think it is. Please, you can’t tell her. If she hates him, she might decide to humiliate him. And that’ll be my fault.”

Ali huffs. “Maybe he deserves it. I saw that fight too, you know?”

“You gotta be kidding me…you know Bobby, Ali. You know that’s not him. Surely you must have noticed what he was like in the time after. He hated himself more than anyone else did.”

Ali chews her lip, and then eventually allows, “I guess you’re right. It was out of character.”

“Exactly. You know he’s the innocent one, out of all of us.”

“Well, Barbara likes the sweet guys. They gotta be manly enough, but she likes to be given flowers.

“So he should…?”

“God, no. I don’t mean that. He’s gotta try to remind her he that he isn’t who she thinks he is, that he’s the guy she used to know, before all of that stuff. Sitting around with that Samantha really didn’t help.”

“Not really his fault.”

She scoffs, “It never is, with guys, is it?”

“Are you _sure_ it didn’t help? Might show her what she’s missing.”

Ali gives me a mocking smile. “You know that doesn’t work, right? And neither does your ‘treat them mean to keep them keen’ shit, either.”

“Funny, you did both of those to me, and they worked real well.”

“Don’t go there,” she says warningly.

“Sorry.”

*

On the way home, I carefully chat to Bobby.

I’ve got time, because it’s the best part of a half hour drive since we have to go all the way around Topanga State Park. And only a moron takes the 101 unless they have no choice, so of course I’m driving toward Santa Monica.

This conversation is a minefield, because Bobby hasn’t actually told me he likes Barbara, not with words, even though he _must_ know I know, because of the few things that happened. So it’s really awkward to think about talking about it, about how to. Even more than that, I can’t let him know I have organised a secret alliance to try to help him out.

“Hey, so I saw you with that chick tonight.”

“Yeah. Samantha.”

“She’s hot.”

“Like an _oven_. She was always cute at school, remember? But she’s amazing now.” I can hear a wistfulness in his voice, which confuses me a bit.

“How far you get?”

It’s not unusual for us to talk like this, although only ever with girls we don’t really care about.

“I guess you’re gonna pay me out, cos I uh, didn’t. We didn’t.”

“How come?”

“Eh.” I see him shrug. “I dunno, I just didn’t feel in the mood.”

I smirk as I pull up at some traffic lights. “She looked in the mood enough for both of you.”

Bobby sighs painfully. “She was… it made it hard to say no, like, I felt bad about it.”

“You poor thing. Having to reject a beautiful woman like that.”

“Fuck off. It’s not like I set out to hurt her feelings. She was with me on the beach walk, and then she was still with me when we went inside, and then she was with me again today. I wasn’t really sure how to make her… not be.”

“Relax, I’m kidding. Anyway, I guess that makes just the two of us tonight, who didn’t score.”

“Right,” Bobby agrees shamefully. “Hey, so where were you? You just said you weren’t getting lucky, but you disappeared again.”

I glance into the rear view mirror before we pull away and I head inland.

“Bobby?” I say, after consideration.

“Yeah?”

“I been talking to Ali again. We, uh, I think we don’t really want anyone to know, right now.”

Bobby slaps me on the knee. “That’s great! Holy shit, Johnny.”

“Right?” I’m grinning. It feels real good to say my news out aloud, actually.

“So, do you think….?” he asks delicately. I can tell from the way he says it that he already knows the answer, the only possible answer.

“Nah. That’s never gonna happen. She tells me that, pretty much five or six times when we talk, too.”

“Maybe it’s not you she’s trying to convince?” Bobby teases.

I laugh an empty sound. “I wish.”

It’s only after he says, after a pause, “Do you?” that I realise what I said.

“Nah, man. Not what I meant. Ancient history, remember?”

“How could I forget, with your reminders?” he says slyly.

“Anyway, it’s just real nice to talk, you know? I’m trying to convince her to give me a shot at being friends. Actually, maybe she has. I’m not sure I’m gonna be able to tell, if or when that happens. You know her.”

“Still a firecracker, huh?”

“Even more than she was,” I agree, smiling to myself.

“Thanks for telling me. I’m not gonna let the guys know… they’re not mature enough for this information. Well, maybe Jimmy is,” he concedes.

“Agreed, and thanks. Although, Jimmy was there the first night we talked, so he might actually know. And it depends if Ali told his girl, too, told anyone. I can’t be sure.”

“Your secret’s safe with me, and I’m even gonna do you a huge favor and cover for you on Saturday, if I notice I need to.”

“You’re the best.”

“I know.”

I glance briefly across at him. “I’ll do you one in return. I don’t know if you noticed who I talked to tonight, but I remembered some things about her.”

Bobby is silent, and I suspect he’s a little annoyed with me for bringing up something embarrassing, but he’ll have to deal with that, if I have any shot of helping him.

“You know she’s a good girl, right?” I say. “I’m not saying she’s a goody two shoes, although she sure as shit can be –”

When he cuts me off with a “Hey!” I smile.

I go on, “But I mean, she’s pretty um, well, she likes a straight game. And she likes nice guys.”

“I’m real nice,” he protests, and he sounds defensive.

“So, you gotta show her that. Tone it down with the stoner stuff, and you better make sure you’ve shaken Samantha off. She doesn’t want that kinda guy. You got plenty you can show her. Turn on the charm, sure, but you’re gonna have to put something a bit more on the line, too.”

Bobby’s got his back up, but I expected that, because he goes through stages of acceptance about things he doesn’t wanna hear. So I get told, “So what, you’re my relationship counsellor now? With your track record?”

“Okay, well first, fuck you, and second, you can feel free to ignore me and fuck yourself twice. What do I care? I’m just delivering what I feel is helpful intel, but you’ve obviously got it covered, so forget it.”

“Shit, man, chill out.” I can practically hear the cogs turning over there. “I guess you’re right. She is a good girl, isn’t she? She always was.” He sighs. “She’s so beautiful.”

“Hey, I don’t wanna hear any mooning shit, alright?”

“Sex talk is okay, and love talk grosses you out? That right? You’re as bad as Dutch.”

“If you ever say that again, I’ll put you on the ground. Maybe in it.”

Bobby laughs.

“And you’d better not be telling me you’re in love with her,” I warn him. “You hardly know her, not anymore.”

Bobby waves a hand. “It was a figure of speech. I like her. I think I could like her a lot, if I can just get her to talk to me.”

“Well, maybe you can try to pull off another superman stunt. I saw the way she looked at you during that heroic saga.”

“Oh yeah?” comes his hopeful voice. This kid really is an innocent.

I’m lying through my teeth, but it’s for a good cause, and I have hardly anything to work with here.


	4. Saturday 2: My List

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Firstly** : ANGST ahead. We can’t get where we’re going without this. And it was really hard to write Johnny in the pain he carries, not just in this chapter, but in general. I’m broken. I hate to think of him hurting, and he sure is about so many things. Although this chapter might be about as low as he gets. You’ll get a glimpse of how much internal work he’s been doing over the past few years, but history casts a long shadow, and it’s not gonna be fixed that easily, as that Haunted by the Past tag indicates. That being said, after the heartbreak in this chapter, we start to move slowly to the unbreak. By the end of the next party (which is 3 chapters), there will have been a huge amount of progress, although please don’t think the angst disappears after that. It’s more that it changes form, and I am sorryyyyyyy, but I can’t tell this story without it.
> 
>  **Okay LONGASS serious note** … not to spoil any thunder, but meta-talk time. Don’t read this if you think it might spoil the story for you to know my thought processes/some headcanons about this ship.
> 
> Disclaimer: These are my personal opinions, and are true for me for this ship, but that doesn’t mean they are the definitive facts, because luckily this is how fandom and fanon works. But – these headcanons are what inform my writing, and I wanted to give some explanation. Can I just say, if you passionately disagree with what I say here, that’s totally cool! But hopefully you don’t use my story as a place to tell me about it, cos this story kind of breaks my heart, and it’s pretty personal.
> 
> I don’t think everything that happens when Johnny and Ali are an item, or even when they’re friends, is healthy, but I’m writing them as if this is real life, and real life isn’t perfect. Relationships are never ideal, even when you love someone, and given their ages when they were dating (14-16 and 15-17), sheesh, big surprise, it had huge problems. And they weren’t all caused by one person.
> 
> Ali is badass, and Johnny is drawn to that. But we know Ali wasn’t and isn’t perfect, even if Johnny basically thinks she is, because he’s flawed, right? Especially where she’s concerned. He can’t see it; he can only see the good in her. There’s something kind of tragic in that. That said, I do believe they have the potential to make a healthy thing happen – it is going to take work, the kind of work that happens in this story. We’re only in chapter 4.
> 
> Johnny will be the first one to do much of that work, since he made a lot of the mistakes, but Ali’s time will come, and I hope you can trust me about that.
> 
> This story is all about giving Johnny the happy ending that he wanted most in his life, which he never got. But a truly earned one, AND I’m going to make sure he gets a good deal. If I’m going to get personal, I guess by the end of the story you’ll see this is kind of my love letter to his character, where he gets his deepest wish, but it actually will be _good_ for him. Yes, I know I take this ship way too seriously.
> 
>  **FINAL Sidebar:** I will do some editing work on making it clearer in coming chapters that Johnny _likes_ Ali being a firecracker. I don’t mean about the hard emotional stuff, but on pretty much everything else, he gets off on her giving him a hard time. It’s flirting for him, and he likes to cause it on purpose, to see what happens next. My headcanon is that it’s their jam. I’m sorry if that wasn’t clear, cos that’s on me XD

Fortunately, even though there’s a big crowd of mostly the same people, who are still mostly able to talk to nearly anyone, we don’t all stay glued to the one spot together on Saturday.

It’s a big relief, because it’s real hard to disappear without being noticed, whereas this way, people just assume you’re probably hanging out just around the corner or something.

“Any progress?” I ask Ali, when I come up to sit next to her on the deck. There’s music again tonight, which makes me feel comfortable no one will hear us talking from down below. It’s not loud, but loud enough, just stuff that’s been popular the last few years.

“Not a lot,” she admits. “I think Tina’s gonna give it a try, though. How about on your end?”

“Well, I didn’t talk to Dutch. I’ll only do that if I think he needs a nudge after she makes her play. I talked to Bobby, though.”

“And?”

“Kid’s got a proper crush, that’s for sure. But he told me that nothing happened with Samantha, and nothing will, which alone tells me he’s got some feelings.”

“Because that’s the only way a guy wouldn’t go for Malibu Barbie, right?”

I smile at the name being similar to my own thoughts. I have always loved seeing Ali get jealous of other girls, even though that sounds sick, because it’s just so nuts that she even gets defensive. How can she possibly be threatened? How can she not know she’s worth about a hundred of any of them?

“Hey, come on.”

“Well, I doubt he’ll get anywhere, but it’s good to hear he’s not just trying to get laid, especially since Barbara’s pretty reserved as far as that goes, anyway. But I still say she won’t change her mind. I feel kinda sorry for him.”

“He’s still the same good guy you knew, Ali. Try to remember that, please. Maybe you can try to send some of that tender sympathy into Barbara?” I suggest.

Ali laughs lightly. “Sure, I can try.”

“Hey?”

“Yeah?”

“There’s something I wanna ask you about. But I’m worried you’ll blow up at me.”

She narrows her eyes. “With how you’re talking, I might.”

“It’s just… it’s playing on my mind. It’s been playing on my mind for _years_ , and I gotta know –”

She cuts me off quickly. “Johnny, I’m not ready to talk about us. I don’t know if I ever want to, and there’s nothing to say, anyway. Please don’t ruin… whatever this is. You and me talking again, just please, don’t.”

I suck in my cheeks. “I already guessed that, and it’s not that.”

“It’s not?”

“No, but I’m worried it will make you even more mad at me than that. Because it’s about… him.”

She sighs heavily and crosses her arms. “Really?”

“Hey, I’m sorry. I can’t help it. I’m not gonna go on about how he took you from me –”

“Which he _didn’t_ ,” she cuts in, bitingly.

“Right,” I say, quickly agreeing, for my own sake, “but I mean, like, what happened with you two?”

Her face has gone real tight. “That’s personal.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”

“Well, I don’t want to.”

“Alright.”

Something hurts inside me, because I’m never gonna get to know, am I? Not about how I could’ve fixed it, not about why she thought he was a good option and then changed her mind so quickly, and not about whether I could’ve ever gotten her back if he hadn’t been in the way.

It sucks, and it _hurts,_ and even so, I can’t blame her for not wanting to tell me. A lot of it isn’t even my business.

Ali speaks again. “If you want me to talk about that, you’re gonna have to come up with something really good in return.”

I make sure not to look too hopefully at her. “Another deal?”

“If you wanna call it that. But I’m not telling you something so private, unless you do. That’s only fair.”

“Sure, that makes sense. What you wanna know?”

She takes a while to reply, and I get the feeling she’s really weighing up whether she wants to say whatever it is, or not. I wait, not moving or staring at her, just standing there calmly and looking down at the beach, even though I’m a little worried about what’s coming.

“There’s only one thing,” says her small voice. “Do you know what you did wrong?”

The breeze is ruffling her hair again when I look at her profile. The fact that I can see emotion on her face, even though I can’t pin down exactly what it is, just about stops me dead. I assumed, after all this time, she wouldn’t care about what happened, would have no more thoughts about it, but clearly that isn’t true.

I think a minute or two must have passed. Finally, I say, “Yeah. I think I do.”

Her eyes flick over to me. “Are you willing to tell me?”

I nod.

“Alright,” she says. “After that, I’ll answer your question.”

I’m pretty businesslike when I start my list. I have it down pat, because I’ve counted the reasons it went wrong far more times than I’d like to admit, over the years.

“There’s five things I wish I could change. Number one. Not get drunk the day of your birthday, so that I show up for you, like I should’ve. I know I really let you down, made you think I didn’t care. That was stupid of me, because nothing was further from the truth. I put that one first, since that was what made you break up with me, even though I know the problems didn’t start there.

“Number two. This one’s kinda impossible, cos I was young and dumb, but I wish I’d known how to talk to you properly, so we could’ve worked things out better, when we used to argue. Then maybe you wouldn’t have been so mad at me on your birthday anyway, maybe you wouldn’t have broken up with me.”

I realise she’s listening real close to everything I’m saying, and she looks at me briefly, then. “That’s maybe true, I think, but like you said, we were fifteen, sixteen. Kids.”

“Number three,” I go on. “I’m sorry about fighting at the beach. If you want me to talk some more about that, I will. Number four. I know this was later, after we were over, but it’s bad, so it’s in the list. I’m sorry I made you kiss me. I was an asshole that night, and I had no right to put my hands on you without asking.

“Number five. I don’t know what to call this one, other than to say I’m sorry I was a jerk sometimes. That’s related to number two, but I’m trying to change.”

She’s faintly shaking her head at me. “I never, _never_ imagined I’d hear you own up for being responsible for things like that.”

There’s a long pause while she stares at me, perhaps wondering if I might take it all back.

I could, I know.

I could stay how I used to be and make excuses for who I am, so that I don’t have to try to change. It’s way, way easier, actually, to live that way. But it keeps you stuck in a shitty life, and I’m _sick_ of my life being shitty.

So I wait calmly, having said the truth, and not regretting any of it.

Then she says haltingly, “I can’t even recognise you, right now.”

“I need to keep some surprises coming, right?”

“Don’t do that, don’t joke. I… I wanna say I appreciate what you said, just now. That can’t have been easy. And… I guess it’s pretty right on. I’m pretty shocked you nailed it, no offence.”

“Well, I’m not an idiot.”

“I know that, I think. But you sure used to be.”

“Ouch.”

“Hey, not all the time, but often enough. So, that’s a pretty fair list. But, come on. What about all the other stuff you guys did to Daniel?”

“That’s happened after you and I,” I counter. “Do we have to talk about that?”

“We don’t have to talk about _anything_. But I thought I’d give you the chance to not brush it under the carpet. Maybe give me some kind of excuse I could believe for why you guys beat him up and nearly killed him.”

“Ugh. Ali, shit. The thing is… look. I’ve got really complex feelings about that prick, you know that, so this is really hard to talk about.”

“Like I said, up to you.”

She’s pinning me with this glance, and I give up. If I want this apology to work, there's no choice.

“I have no excuse. I already said I regretted the beach. And we shouldn’t have chased him on his bike, especially not five onto one. That was an asshole move. I also wish I hadn’t lost my temper at Halloween when he came into the restrooms. Running after him was the wrong move.”

She crosses her arms. “And what about nearly killing him? Was that the wrong move, too?”

“Yes.”

There’s disbelief written all over her face. “You’re seriously not going to try to defend what happened?”

“There’s no way to defend it.”

“You’re not even gonna blame Cobra Kai and your sensei?”

“That might be where I got the poison from, but it was my choice to believe it.”

I can see by the look in her eyes that she’s still trying to work out who the fuck I am. I get that, even if it offends me, because I’m still _me._

All I’m trying to do is get rid of some of the shitty parts, that I don’t like, the parts that I’m ashamed of ever being.

“It was my mistake,” I add.

She’s sad now, for some reason. Just looking at me with these sad eyes, and I’m staring back at her, wishing I knew how to take it away for her.

Then she says, “Johnny, I…I’m gonna go. It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you just said, but I need to think before I can respond. I never expected you to just admit you were wrong.”

I know my face falls, and I look quickly down, turning away, cos I don’t want her to see what I’m thinking. It hurts that she’s going to just leave, after I bared absolutely everything to her. It’s like a rejection, but not of me when I do stupid shit, more like rejection even when I try my hardest, my very best, and still it falls way short of where it needs to be.

“I’m sorry,” I say thickly, knowing I’m never going to be good enough, that I can never make up for the past.

“No, it’s… it’s okay. I’m not mad at you. I’ll see you on Wednesday, alright?”

I nod, and she moves away, slowly at first, like she’s waiting for me to say something, and then I hear her going down the stairs.

I don’t call after her that she never fulfilled her side of the deal. She never told me what I wanted to know the most.

*

I stand there for a long time, I think. I’m raw, and I guess pretty down, and I don’t know if I can tell what all the reasons for it are.

It was really intense, just then. I let her see everything, and now I can’t undo that and re-hide it from her. She’ll always know.

I’m thinking about how she seemed to accept my regrets, even though I wasn’t sure she would, but then she left, so I don’t know what it means. The hope that Ali might forgive me, even a little bit, is the worst ache I have ever felt in my chest. I know it’s beyond stupid to hope for it.

The wait until I see her again on Wednesday is going to kill me, but I’m going to keep reminding myself she _said_ she’d see me, which means we’ll talk, I assume.

I think I’ll head home, because I can’t face company. I’ve got Bobby to think of, of course, but he can either come with me or I’m sure he can get a lift later.

But when I get to the bottom of the stairs, I see Dutch and Tommy are sitting on the outside chairs, and they aren’t far from where Tina, Connie and Jennifer are, in their own little circle.

As little as I feel like it, I know an opportunity when I see one. Who knows, maybe it can distract me.

I grab a few drinks from the bar, and bring them out to my friends, who pull up a chair for me.

“Busy night?” Tommy asks.

“Oh, you know,” I say non-committed. I guess I was gone for a real long time, like hours, but I’m not going to bother making up an explanation. “How about you?”

“Well, our friend here went skinny dipping again, and then I forced him to put his clothes back on, because he decided to take a bunch of people out to see his car, after he came back. I coulda done with some back up.”

I grin at Dutch. “She going okay out there?”

“She’s fine. I made sure to give her a rub down.”

If only I properly knew Tina, I could try to bring her into this conversation, but I’m still trying to think about how to.

She’s not far from us, and if I’m not mistaken with her body language, she is keeping half an ear on what we’re talking about, while listening to Jennifer talking about New Years’ Eve.

I do tend to think this girl is crazy for liking Dutch on purpose, which I always wonder might be the kind of thing that happens accidentally to girls, on the spur of a moment before they can come to their senses, but she’s not bad looking. She could pass his test no problem, in the right circumstances, but she comes across as very far from type, with her heavy boots, black jeans and jacket, not to mention the glasses. She’s got nice hair, pretty long down her shoulders, and she’s got her fringe spiked up so you can see her face a lot more, as long as you remember to look past the glasses, which I know lots of people don’t.

“You set up at home to look after her, then?” I ask, hoping that I haven’t forgotten if he’s already told us that.

“Oh yeah. I got some space in the garage now, so I can fit her and the bike, and work on them when I need to.”

I notice Tina checking him out then, although of course he didn’t.

“You go riding much?”

“Oh, not right now. I can’t have my baby get jealous, right?”

Tommy rolls his eyes at me. “Hey, we should go for a ride?”

“Yeah, that’d be great,” I say. “Let’s organise that. Maybe we can go up to Red Rock again, and try to get the beers all the way there this time.”

Dutch laughs. “Better not let you have them on your bike, then.”

I breathe in. “Hey, Tina?” I say, calling across.

She turns to me, a little surprised I’m talking to her, although it’s not the first words we’ve ever exchanged in our lives. It’s good the ice broke between the groups a bit, because she’s not unfriendly, when she says, “Yeah, Johnny?”

“You came with us that day. I remember you got your own bike, a Honda.”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

Dutch looks at her with a bit of disbelief, looking down at her jacket. “You ride?”

“Sure,” she says, although I see her eyes tighten, and I think she’s crestfallen he doesn’t remember her. The only girl we all knew with a bike is kind of a thing he should be able to recall, I think, although it had slipped my mind, too, until the other day. All I can say is we were pretty set on what kinda chicks we looked at or didn’t, and the rest were invisible, exactly like Dutch is still behaving now, even though the rest of us have grown up, well, to different extents.

“Don’t mind him,” I say to smooth it over, “he’s got a memory like a goldfish. Ask him what happened yesterday, and he wouldn’t have a clue.”

Dutch just laughs at this, although Tommy is giving me an odd look for why I’m talking quite deliberately to someone pretty out of our ordinary. Maybe he thinks I’m gonna chat her up, right there with them all listening, even though she’s not the kind of girl we’d normally do that to. I choose not to look anywhere in his direction, and pretend I don’t see it.

“You still got it?” I ask. “You still ride?”

One side of her lips goes up in this crooked smile. She’s obviously proud of herself. “Of course. And I look after my bike myself, too.”

Dutch makes a scoffing sound, but I’m pleased to see amusement appear on his face. That means he’s engaged. He says scornfully, “You know how to work on your bike, do you?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” she asks him back, no trace of intimidation.

If only I could high five someone right now, but I can’t, and so I sit here, hoping I can retreat from the talking now they’ve started. Connie better not keep looking at Jennifer like that. Does she wanna give the game away?

“Oh, really,” Dutch replies, with this sarcastic tone, like he’s speaking to a small child that doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Tina doesn’t seem bothered. She’s got a bit of a badass attitude, if I’m honest, and I think it probably could be attractive to the right guy. Dutch asks, “And how did you learn that?”

“My dad. He used to race.”

In spite of himself, I can tell Dutch is at least a tiny bit impressed. “So whatcha got?”

“A three-fifty, got it when I turned 15, although I couldn’t ride it legally.” I gotta congratulate this girl for her game: you’d never tell she’s got a crush with how level she’s playing it, just staring coolly across like she doesn’t mind this conversation, but she wouldn’t care if it wasn’t happening either.

“Legally?” Dutch asks.

“Yeah. So I just rode it.”

She doesn’t even blink as she says this, and Dutch is forced to grin, because she’s pushing every correct button for him, although I wouldn’t think he’ll be seeing her a girl at all, more like an unexpectedly cool person, than a female, which might be its own problem, later.

“You ever get caught?”

“Nope. Nearly, once.”

Dutch hums in thought. “A three-fifty, not bad for a starter bike, but you know you can do better than that, right?”

She smiles slightly. “Maybe. I’m saving up.”

I think I can safely make my excuses now, and try to find Bobby, and get out of here. They’ve made a start, and it’s up to Tina now.

As I’m walking away, I hear her ask about his car.

Tommy shoots me a glance, like a question I can nearly _hear_ , but I shrug as if I don’t understand what’s happening either, and make tracks before he can call me out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For another take on what happened at the beach in Chapter 2, and after that, read "Rising Tide" by KingKarate. IT'S AMAZING, and you need to XD Although don't get ahead of the story progress here, because you will get spoiled. You can either read alongside Malibu, or you can finish this one with Johnny's POV and then head over there and read that one from start to finish with the different narrator :) Tina will tell you her story, and she is not on the same journey as Johnny, although their stories do cross over a lot.
> 
> I wrote one brief piece of work with Tina as the narrator, which you will see linked later on during Malibu, and then after that, I handed her over to KingKarate, who has written Tina's story from well before the moment I wrote about, until after that time too. So again, you can make some choices about whether you want to hear from Tina during this fic, or keep them separate. Both ways have been enjoyed by readers. My personal recommendation is separately read this one to the finish and then that one, because I like to immerse in the narrators' journey and not jump back and forth. But other people have liked the side-by-side reading of the same parties, with different points of view. Totally up to you.


	5. Wednesday 3, Part 1: Tommy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Really long-ass party coming up! Like maybe 10+ hours of stuff happening XD So I’ve split it into three parts, since there wasn’t a good place to split into two and it's huge. In a story with multiple plotlines, we've got a big focus on the Cobra Kais this chapter, and Part 2 zooms back in on some of the plots.
> 
> Thank you to the amazing KingKarate, MandyJ, rebates912 and Tori Tarantino for the wonderful comments. You’ve truly blessed my little heart; honestly I can't express how much. I love that people are enjoying the canon characters and the story, and I’m so grateful to hear about it from you! Thank you to the readers and thank you for kudos. It's very appreciated.
> 
> Also thanks to the Tina stans out there: it’s great to have an OC make a good impact this way.
> 
> Okay, off we go.

“So, a night to get completely wasted?” Tommy asks me, when he’s handing me a big pour of scotch. I got here a bit earlier in the day, today, and we’re sitting with Bobby down on the sand, while it’s still daylight, still the afternoon, with a bottle and some tumblers.

“We could,” I agree, even though I know I won’t. I’ll need my wits about me to keep working on Ali, because Saturday was really important. I think, or at least I hope, I might have made progress with how she thinks about me, but I can’t tell for sure until we talk, and there’s still a long fucking way to go, I know. And a number of other issues might demand attention tonight, too.

“Hey,” I say, throwing a smirk to Bobby on my left, and Tommy on my right. “Is there anywhere I shouldn’t, you know, be sitting, when I come down here?”

Tommy chortles, and Bobby just grins, because he knows he doesn’t need to answer my question.

“It’s a bit late for that,” Tommy says, with a fake look of disgust. “You know what Dutch is like. Best not to think about it.”

I watch him. “That chick he was talking to was pretty cool, right?”

“Yeah, I guess,” he says offhandedly. “Except they started to go on about cars, so much that I got bored. She likes them as much as he does, which is way too much. Like, if she was a guy, I woulda said it was a measuring contest first up, but then they started to go into all this mechanic shit. Apparently she actually worked in her dad’s shop on the weekend, back in high school, because she seemed to know her stuff.”

I smile, very happy about that update. But I say, “Sorry to hear. I guess Dutch woulda been happy to have a new pair of ears to talk to about his car, huh?”

“Oh yeah. Luckily, Erin came up after not too long, and she had a couple friends. She saved me. Dutch changed his focus pretty quickly too, and that was the end of that.” Tommy smiles at me knowingly. “The night got more fun, from then on.”

I take a drink of my scotch. Poor Tina, I think; that part’s not so good. But then again, this is the girl who’s decided to like Dutch, so she could hardly be surprised, assuming she’s ever been around him before, which she has. I’m glad I wasn’t there when that went down.

“Erin’s looking good,” Bobby says. “Didn’t you get with her, like, years ago?”

I think I remember that, too, cos she was in our year, in my Senior English class.

“Yeah, once,” says Tommy, smiling. “I don’t mind her. She’s real fun, actually.”

Tommy will go around with a girl for a little while, sometimes, although it never gets very serious, pretty much not since high school.

“How ‘bout you and Samantha?” he asks in return.

“No dice,” Bobby says. “I decided she’s not my type.”

Tommy gives Bobby a look like he just said he likes to eat bugs, and like maybe Tommy doesn’t wanna be friends anymore, with someone so unbalanced.

“Pretty sure that girl would be _anyone’s_ type.”

Bobby shrugs and lets some sand fall through his fingers. “Well, not mine. I got my eye on someone else.”

I hear Tommy’s immediate interest. “Anything you care to share?”

“Nope.”

“Man of mystery.” Tommy sighs, annoyed, and turns to me. “How ‘bout you, Johnny?”

“How about me?”

Tommy looks at me suspiciously. “Since when did you all get so secretive with your details? I’m gonna start taking this real personally.”

I take another sip and consider him. He’s been pretty good to me, lately, a good friend. “Tommy, I been thinking about something else than girls. I got something going on.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Can I trust you? I’ll tell you. But you can’t tell our friend. And you sure as hell better not ruin it for me.”

Tommy smiles easily. “Hey, sure, man. Anything I can do to help?”

“Nah, I doubt it, but the thing is… well…” I look him in the eyes. “She’s been talking to me, again.”

He nods, like I’ve said something that didn’t need explaining. “I figured she must be. She’s been acting different to you.”

“She has, hasn’t she?” I agree cautiously.

He looks out at this boat that’s going past, and I see him smiling to himself. He asks teasingly, “You guys getting in some alone time, then?”

I can tell he meant it as a joke, but I still feel the need to say, “You know it’s not gonna be like that.” He nods, and sighs. “But actually, yes, that’s exactly what we’ve been doing. We talk for ages, just us. And… it’s pretty great.”

“Sneaky fucker, I didn’t even see you going off.”

“Well, we’re not amateurs.”

“And what do you think about this?” he asks Bobby, knowing I woulda told him first.

“I think it’s great.”

“You think it’s great.” Tommy rolls his eyes and looks disparagingly at Bobby. “Might I remind you, that girl caused a lot of havoc for Johnny?”

“Yeah, but they aren’t together, now,” Bobby reminds him. “They aren’t gonna be, so it’ll be okay.”

“What a sweet, innocent child you are,” Tommy says with a sad sigh. I know why he’s saying it to Bobby, and not to me, even though he’s actually giving me the message. It makes it way less awkward for us, so I appreciate it, even if he’s saying some bullshit.

Tommy continues, “She’s a handful of fire, as far as Johnny goes. Don’t you remember what he was like, after? And what it was like even when they were together? Johnny can’t keep his head, when it comes to her.”

I narrow my eyes, but Bobby says, “They’re just talking.”

“We’ll see about that.”

“Bobby’s right,” I say. “As much as I wanna thank you for believing in my way with women, that won’t work on Ali, and I’m not even thinking of trying. I’m not after that from her. Seriously, I’m happy to settle for being her friend.”

“Since when?”

“Screw you. There’s more to her than that, anyway. Not my problem if you don’t know that.”

Tommy just gives an impatient shake of his head, and I know we’re not gonna see eye to eye on any of this. I say firmly, “We’re getting along, real well, actually.”

By the look in Tommy’s eyes, I can see that worries him, and I can’t see why on earth it would. But he drops it when Jimmy comes up and sits down by his other side.

“Hey, man,” Bobby greets him. “When’s the music gonna get started?”

“Soon, people are still chatting, and Jennifer’s organising the food. I was just helping out, then.”

Tommy laughs a harsh breath, and nudges Jimmy’s knee with his own. “You’re disgustingly tamed; you’re basically a housewife. You know that, right?”

“Thanks, Tommy.”

“Hey, no need to be jealous,” I add. “I’m sure if you ask Dutch real nice, he’ll think about settling down, eventually, and you guys can have everything you dream of.”

“Fuck off,” Tommy says with a grin. “Say that again, and they’ll never find your body.”

It’s always been this way, him and Dutch, and me with Bobby, two sets of best friends, and I think maybe I always knew that that put Jimmy on the edge in a way that I wished it didn’t, but wasn’t sure how to do anything about. I’m glad he’s got his girl now, because I can see he thinks the sun shines out of her, and she’s exactly the same. Jimmy deserves that.

“I wondered what you guys were talking about down here,” he says. “It looked serious.”

Tommy gives a dismissive sound. “Just trying to stop Johnny from bringing the sky down to cave in on his head, but he doesn’t wanna hear it.”

“Is this about Ali?” Jimmy asks me.

“You know? About…. that?”

Jimmy raises his eyebrows. “You don’t think I know who’s upstairs in my own house?”

I look away and smile. “Thank you. You started me off. If you hadn’t, I don’t know for sure I would’ve had the balls.”

“Sure you would’ve,” Jimmy says simply. “I gave a mere hint, nothing more.”

“So this is your fault, then?” Tommy asks him, resigned.

“What’s my fault?”

“Well, nothing yet. But when it happens, it will be.”

“Seriously,” I say to Tommy, frustrated with my friend, because he is so wrong, and because he won’t just drop it. “Read my lips. Ali will never take me back, and I’m not gonna ask her to. That is one hundred percent off the table.”

“Maybe, Johnny,” Tommy says quietly, and it seems kinda final. “But that doesn’t mean you won’t get your heart broken again.”

“Not going to happen.”

“Hey,” Jimmy says. “Let’s give Johnny the benefit of the doubt. He’s grown up a lot.”

“Oh, not that much,” Bobby chimes in, and I punch him lightly and then stand up, drink in hand.

I look at Jimmy. “Hope you don’t mind me leaving you with these guys. They can be a bit much, but give them a chance. They don’t really have any other friends.”

Tommy’s trying to fight a smile, and flipping me off, which I return before I put my hands in my pockets and head up to the house.

*

I’m standing on the patio in the middle of a group of guys: Bobby, Steve, Aaron, Greg, Freddy and a few others, and we’ve been talking about football for a while, when a couple of the girls from Ali’s group come over, and start chatting to Aaron and Greg. So we all start to talk about more things from high school after that. It’s Tina, Connie, Nicole and Jennifer, but the ones I’d call the central three are missing.

Connie’s being warm to me now, which I’m gonna guess is probably entirely due to the thing with Tina the other day, even though she doesn’t know I had a plan from the start, and probably just thinks it was nice of me to be friendly. I’m finding the way she’s treating me extremely funny, because it’s a one-eighty on how she and some of the others looked at me that first day.

“Do you remember that time with the water slides, that Ali talked about?” she asks me.

“How could I possibly forget?”

She laughs, and sips from her glass. She’s still got her short hair, and she dresses way more like Barbara than Tina. “We used to go to Knott’s like every week, for a while, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, we had a real phase where we couldn’t get enough of it.” That was when things were great with me and Ali, in the summer after sophomore year for me, and it was an incredible summer for many reasons, very much including how often I got to see her in her bathing suit. She hadn’t really let me see fully underneath it at that stage, not all at the same time, so it meant quite a bit to me.

“Didn’t Jimmy have to go buy some new shorts that day?” Freddy asks.

I nod. “Sure did. They disappeared, like into the filter or some shit, I can’t remember.”

“Maybe some chick claimed them as a souvenir,” Tina puts in, smirking at Jennifer. “Jimmy was easy on the eye back then, I wouldn’t blame her.”

I stare at her for a moment, wondering if she always had this confidence, or whether she’s been working on it, because I feel like I’d remember it. She’s joking like a guy would, and it seems to come naturally to her. I can’t help but wonder exactly how she fits into Ali’s group, especially how she would wanna be friends with Susan or Barbara.

Connie’s laughing, because Jennifer is glaring at her friend, but trying not to smile. She says, “Firstly, Jimmy is still very easy on the eye, let me assure you. And secondly, I don’t think I like you thinking about him in that way. So you can cut it out.”

I grin at Tina, and she smiles back, and winds some of her long hair around a finger. “Don’t worry, you know I don’t think of _Jimmy_ that way.”

Jennifer looks at her and gives her this dramatic sigh. “No, you don’t have such good taste, which I know well enough.”

Connie looks a little awkward, since she clearly knows what Jennifer is hinting at, and thinks that I don’t, so she tries to move the conversation on for Tina’s sake.

“It’s nice, all us talking again. It’s fun.”

“Sure is,” Steve agrees. “We doing anything particular for New Year's?” he asks Jennifer.

“You got any ideas?” she asks us at large. That keeps everyone busy for a while, and Bobby is pushing for a night ride, which Tina gets quickly on side with, but Jennifer is talking about dancing and a beach party, which some others prefer.

Ali comes and joins the group, after we’ve been here a while.

Her friends make way for her and she says hi to them, to everyone, and then does a nervous little gesture with her hair as she crosses the circle to stand next to me instead.

“Hey,” she says.

I’m looking at her, trying not to show surprise. “Hey.”

Her friends barely even notice, which means they already knew we’ve been chatting, and I wish Bobby didn’t give me that sly look, but I can feel the others looking at us with interest as we start talking.

It’s written in Ali’s face that she’d like to say something important, I guess about the way the other night finished up, but can’t, since we’re being watched. So she says lightly, “So I ran into your mom at the store the other day.”

“Yeah, she mentioned it.”

“It was good to see her. We got chatting for a few minutes, and I forgot how nice she is.”

“Yeah.” Our conversation quickly loses interest for the others, because I hear a few voices resume around us.

I look at Ali, silently asking her why it’s now okay that people know we’re talking again. It doesn’t bother me, but she definitely seemed to want to keep it secret before.

She just shrugs and smiles slightly. “How are you?” she asks.

“I’m fine. You?”

“I’m good. I just meant… I’m sorry about how I left things the other night.”

She’s talking quietly enough to be private, and I do the same. “It’s okay, no big deal. I get it.” I try to look quite casual, and not too into what we’re saying, which might draw attention, and in any case, she doesn’t need to know how low I was feeling afterwards.

“Can we go for a walk later?” she asks.

“Sure.”

“I know I owe you a deal from the weekend.”

I swallow and look down. “That’s okay. You don’t have to talk about that, if you don’t want to.”

I kinda hate myself for offering her a way out, but I can’t seem to help it for some reason.

“A promise is a promise.”

“Okay,” I say, and she smiles at me, before she starts up talking to Greg.

*

Later on, when the group’s changed a bit to no longer include any of the girls except Tina and Connie, and now includes Dutch and Tommy, I’m impressed to see Tina managed to catch Dutch’s attention enough that they start up talking again. She’s obviously forgiven him for his way with girls, and let’s be honest, she’s gonna have to be very forgiving of a lot of things if she likes him for real.

Tommy whispers conspiratorially to me, “Is there something in particular going on that I would find interesting?”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Right. So, about that ride. Should we wait for New Year?”

“We don’t have to.”

“Where you wanna go?”

I shrug. “I don’t mind so much.”

“How wide we wanna throw the invitation, you reckon?”

“Anyone, I guess.”

“What’s all this?” Dutch cuts in.

“We’re going for a ride,” I explain. “It’s on two wheels, though, so I’m not sure if it’s gonna be your thing.”

He smiles smugly. “I can force myself. Sounds like a great idea.”

I give him a few seconds to think of it, to remember that Tina is standing next to him, but I realise he isn’t going to.

So I come in with, “You joining, Tina?”

“She’d better,” Dutch says. “I wanna see if she’s full of shit, or if she can put her money where her mouth is.”

It’s almost painful to see her reaction to that, and the way she hides it, which is easy to do from Dutch because he doesn’t know to look for it, even though it’s fucking _obvious_ to me. That girl has it bad, and again, I consider her mental wellbeing questionable, at best.

“Sure,” Tina says.

“Oh great,” Connie sighs. “You’re such a tomboy.”

“You’re just jealous you can’t ride. You know I’m always here, if you wanna learn.”

Connie looks like she tasted something bad. “No thanks, I’ll keep my limbs, and my brain intact.”

I wonder if the rest of Ali’s friends might have forgotten they used to like the bikes quite a bit, too, back in the day, even when they didn’t go riding with anyone. Maybe it’s part of this new prim and proper act of theirs. But I guess most of them are starting to loosen up a bit, at least, although I’m less confident about the two who I know could cause problems for me, when I’m trying to be friends with Ali.

Tina smirks at Dutch, who mirrors the gesture. “Suit yourself.”

It’s a little later, after more engine talk from them, and the rest of us doing our own thing, when Dutch says, looking at Tina, but loud enough for all of us, “Hey, wanna come see her?”

“I was hoping you’d say that.”

A few of them take off together, inside and then out the back door, including Connie, who trails along looking bored already, but she tries to keep up with her friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We get some Barbara next chapter! Poor girl… she gets talked about a lot, but it’s tough to get her in live scenes, since Ali is the one who has the job to work on her friend’s situation, and also since she hasn’t really been talking to Johnny much. But yes, she will be here :) Also Susan :’) (I love her. She is a queen. In this story I am constrained to write her from Johnny's POV, and in particular, where she is currently at with him. Please read the various notes (Chap 6/7) if you need illumination about that)
> 
> And a really, really big scene.


	6. Wednesday 3, Part 2: Difficult Conversations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you SO much for the feedback, to KingKarate, MandyJ, rebates912, Tori Tarantino and sam. Your comments are super LIFEGIVING <3 It’s beyond exciting to know that this is working for you!!!!,
> 
> For this chapter, let’s all keep in mind that the various characters speak with their own thoughts, the thoughts which I feel are in character for them, given the time period and what we’ve learned in KK1-3 and Cobra Kai (and where old/new canon has conflicting facts, or missing facts, I’ve made choices based upon what I believe makes the most sense for the characters, in my context). And let’s also keep in mind, most people tend to think they’re in the right about things they go through, a hero/ine of their own story.
> 
> Therefore, it shouldn’t be very surprising, I hope, that even now, in these particular party group/s, there is a limited amount of people who were/are Daniel stans. Although, I guess you’re about to hear from one of them, haha :) No offense meant, and this is a story.
> 
> Hope this chapter does it for you. Thanks again for reading and enjoying.

When I head inside, Ali’s with just Susan and Barbara on the sofas. I’m not sure when she means us to go for a walk, but now that I know it’s happening, I feel both relaxed and nervous, because I don’t know what she’s gonna say about the things I told her, let alone whether finally hearing from her about what I wanna know is actually going to make my life any better, or somehow far, far worse.

I glance at her uncertainly, but the smile tells me it’s okay for me to come over, so I approach them.

“Hey,” I say, looking between them all, standing there with my hands in my pockets.

"Hey,” Ali says, followed by Barbara, pretty blank, but not so bad.

Susan, on the other hand, crosses her arms. “Hey yourself.”

I bite back a smile and decide to ignore her and focus on my better prospect, which I need to be doing anyway.

“I saw you down on the beach before,” I tell Barbara.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. That was some impressive shit. So you’re still in cheer squad?”

Her face softens a little. “Yeah. I got in, and we’re training for this big meet.”

“It looked real cool, you and Jennifer.”

Susan breathes in and out in an irritated way, but I pretend not to notice.

I think up some more questions about it, about her training, how the squad’s been going, what’s it like at USC compared to school, and Barbara seems flattered to answer, and it seems like she starts to forget that we haven’t been talking this much for years. I’d like to sit down, but given that Ali’s in the middle, and Barbara is up at the end of the sofa with no space next to her, the only space is by Susan, so I can’t.

I ask Ali, “You got time for that up at Stanford?”

“Nah. Pre-med, you know.”

“Really?”

She blushes. “Yeah. I mean, I don’t have to major, obviously, but I gotta do as well as I possibly can with my course to get in. So, I’m pretty busy as it is. I really miss it, though. How ‘bout you, Johnny? You haven’t told me if you’re still doing karate?”

I blow out a breath. “Well, obviously not with Cobra Kai. I did uh, I did try a few other places. It’s a bit different now, though, being over eighteen. I dunno… I guess I’ve kinda let it drop.”

“That’s a shame,” Barbara joins in. “I mean… you were always the best.”

I sense Susan’s words, right before they come out, because she gets this sour look. “Well, except for that time he _wasn’t_.”

An insult like that from her couldn’t bother me any less, really, because at the moment, I seem to be ahead in all the battles I care about, so I let it slide off my skin.

“Well, nobody wins them all, right?” I say, pretty lightly, careful not to sound as dismissive of her as I actually feel.

I think she’s annoyed I didn’t react, so that’s a win of its own. Anything she’s willing to do to look like the unreasonable one, the immature one, of the two of us, I’m all for.

She’s crossed her arms again, and she’s watching me very darkly. “Whatever.”

Ali gives a bit of an embarrassed smile. “Hey, you and the guys should give us a show, one night.”

I pause for a few seconds, thinking. “I guess we could. I’ll speak to them about it, and we’ll see.”

“People would love it,” Barbara agrees. “So you stopped going to your old dojo, huh? How about the other guys?”

“Yeah, we all quit right after that tournament, actually.”

“Really?” I get the feeling she’s confirming a story she’s been told, rather than hearing the news for the first time, but I can’t be sure.

I hope it won’t be too much, when I add, “Yeah. I mean, what Bobby was asked to do made us all sick. Right away, we knew it was a huge mistake. Our sensei was a real creep.”

Barbara nods slowly, like she’s thinking I might be making sense, and like she’s willing to see things in a different light, maybe.

Ali’s watching me, and there’s no other word for it than impressed. I have to agree with her: I feel like I should be getting paid for this.

But Susan frowns. “Sure took you all long enough to realise that. And anyway, it obviously wasn’t ‘right away’. Because you got that warning, _didn’t_ you, Johnny? And that was _after_ Bobby.”

What is she, a fucking lawyer?

“Yeah,” I admit. “That was a mistake. I wish it’d never happened.”

She sniffs. “It didn’t ‘happen’, Johnny – _you_ did it.”

There’s only one way for me to go now, and I’m not looking forward to it.

But I judge that I will lose _far_ too much with Ali if I don’t, because we haven’t really talked about this yet, and it’s yet another thing on my list of past fuck ups. We’re gonna have to face it sooner or later, so I guess it might as well be now.

I wasn’t planning to have to defend myself when I walked up to them, and certainly not to _Susan_ , or Barbara: my plans were all about Bobby, but I guess it’s all too related in people’s eyes. Maybe it’s worth trying to win points with Susan, anyway, or at least be seen to be being reasonable if she won’t be, because she’s going to make it more difficult for Ali and I to be friends, otherwise.

So I get it over with, including in it everything that I want Ali to hear, even though it’s Susan I speak to.

“You’re right. I did do it, and I broke the rules and got a warning. More than that, I tried to take the easy way out by doing it, so that I could win. When Kreese gave me the order, I knew it was wrong, and I don’t think I was planning to go through with it. Then I panicked, worried he was gonna beat me, and right away, I knew I deserved to lose because of it. The result, as much as I hate it, was what I deserved.”

I’m stopping _way_ short of saying LaRusso deserved to win, which I sure as _hell_ don’t believe either, especially considering that kick of his. _Neither_ of us deserved it.

I’ve shocked all of them, I think, by being so up front. By admitting it. Ali less so, but I don’t care if the others know about this. In a way, it would be good if word spread to anyone else still holding onto old grudges. It might clear the air.

Ali seems to decide she doesn’t mind publicly backing me, then, because she speaks up. “It takes some guts to say that.”

What she doesn’t finish with is, ‘don’t you think?’ But I think we all hear it in her tone, anyway.

“Oh, sure,” Susan adds snidely. “And I’m not buying a word of it. So you have regrets. Big deal. I’m sure Daniel still regrets how his leg was damaged that night.”

I hold back my sigh.

It’s far more annoying when Barbara begins to agree. “Right… it’s all very well to say you’re sorry, or for Bobby to, but it could’ve been a permanent injury.”

I feel the momentum shifting, and I need to be careful, so I wait a beat, and try to speak pretty calmly, although I don’t fully manage to keep the tension from my voice. “Bobby did say sorry to LaRusso quite a few times. I guess I can’t blame the guy for not having it, but I’m not sure what else Bobby can do at this point. He can’t go back and undo it. Neither can I.”

I feel like asking Susan, what, she’s never made a big mistake? But that feels like very definitely not a good idea.

Barbara just shrugs a little, clearly undecided now, and it might be time to let it rest. I would like to think of a new topic, pretty badly, before this gets worse.

“Hey,” Ali says to her friends. “I promised Johnny I’d go for a walk with him.”

I flinch and my eyes widen, wishing she hadn’t worded it like that. She’s the one who thought that up, not me, and I don’t want to be blamed by either of them for it.

Susan is, of course, looking at me suspiciously. “You sure that’s a good idea?”

Ali just laughs and stands up. “Relax. We won’t be long. We’re just gonna go up the beach a bit, to talk.”

“I want it noted that I think this is a bad decision. If you trust him, that’s your funeral.”

Ali gives me a quick smile, just a flash, which encourages me, and she turns to her friend.

She says gently, “I’m sorry to say, I do trust him. He’s… my friend, Susan. I know that’s weird, but it’s what it is, and maybe you’ll get used to it. So… we’re gonna go for a walk.”

Susan looks peeved that Ali has taken my side in front of her. Barbara looks unsure about it all too, but to nowhere near the same extent.

“Hey,” I say to her. “If you’re still interested, I can try to see if I can set up the show Ali mentioned, sometime. I’ll let you know if we organise anything, if you want?”

“Okay,” she says neutrally, but with how she looks at Susan, I can tell she won’t be disloyal. “Maybe I’ll come watch, I’ll see.”

“Cool.”

I leave it at that.

When we we’re walking down the steps, Ali says to me, “Don’t worry too much, that was pretty nicely done.”

I laugh, relieved to be away from that room. “Doesn’t feel like it.”

“No,” she disagrees, “I can almost say good job, although it didn’t pan out right at the end with them. We’re gonna have to be patient.”

“And here I was thinking _you_ give me a hard time. You got nothing on Susan.”

Ali sighs. “She’s gonna be the last to come around to all of you, if she ever does. And she might not. With how much she dislikes Tommy, I’d almost think she still has a thing for him. Some of my friends have been like that when they liked someone.”

“Now, wait a minute,” I say. “I thought ‘treating them mean’ was bullshit?”

“It is,” she replies simply.

“Oh, but it’s okay if a girl does it? They have different rules?” I shake my head, and mutter, “Why am I not surprised to hear that…”

Ali frowns threateningly. “ _Don’t_ get me started on different rules for guys and girls. That’s an argument you will lose.”

I hold up my hands in surrender. “Okay, okay. Fine.”

We take off up the beach, past a few people that wave at us, some who do a double take, friends sitting in groups down here. It’s night time, but Jimmy’s started to bring those torches down sometimes, and there’s a few of them on the beach outside his house.

“Anyway,” Ali says. “I know she really doesn’t. Susan, I mean. It’s just a total woman scorned thing for her, and think I may have mentioned she can hold a grudge, like it’s a sport. That alone would have you in the crossfire, by association. Let alone everything else from the past, and because of you and me.”

“Well, as long as you’re okay with her looking down on you for talking to me.”

“I can live with it. You’re winning Barbara over, little by little, which I have to say is impressive.”

“Thanks.” I smile.

“No need to look so cocky.”

“I _feel_ cocky. I’m achieving way more than you, let’s be honest.”

Ali shoves me lightly. I’m not sure if she realises it’s the first time she’s touched me, but I sure as hell do.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means you need to catch up, Ali. I’m doing all of this myself, both sides of the deal, and by the way, I have to say it’s going pretty well, but some help would be nice.” I give her a scornful look. “Have you even done _anything_?”

Ali grins and picks up a rounded stone, rubbing it inside her hand as we walk.

“That’s so totally not fair, considering all the work I’m putting in with Barbara for Bobby, and you. Do you ever wonder why she’s willing to hear you out?”

“Oh, so now you’re gonna take credit for that?”

“The credit is mine,” she tells me confidently. “You’re not _that_ charming.”

“You sure?” I ask, raising my eyebrows.

“Very,” she says definitely. “But I admit, I guess you’re basically a genius with the Tina thing.”

I make a nod, pretending humility. “I know,” I sigh. “I’m surprising even myself. He’s eating out of her hand, although, like I suspected, he now thinks she’s a guy he might wanna be friends with.”

Ali grimaces. “That’s not the best, but I guess it’s a start.”

“Hey, at least this way she can try to get close to him. What she does with it from there isn’t really up to me.”

“Yeah. Well, she’s had some boyfriends, so, she’s probably got a few plays.”

“She’s gonna need them.”

Ali smiles, and then goes quiet for a while, while we walk. We pass a couple houses with the beachside lights on, others where you can see people inside, and an occasional other person out on the beach. The tide’s coming in, and we take our shoes off and carry them, starting to walk right near the shoreline, so sometimes the water touches our feet.

I get a little wetter than her, since I’m on the sea side, so I bend down to roll up my jeans.

Ali’s stopped, waiting for me, and when I look up, she’s lightly crossed her arms, her shoes dangling from the fingers of one hand.

“Alright,” she says. “I acknowledge what you said on Saturday, Johnny. It’s big to admit you were wrong, and not use an excuse.”

I can’t quite work out what to say to that, so I slowly start walking again, the words pounding in my ears, and she starts up next to me.

Eventually I manage, “That means a lot.”

I can feel her watching me when she says, “I know that. I guess it meant a lot to me, that you were willing to say all of that.”

I nod, glad she recognises it might have been pretty embarrassing, in a way, and she goes on, “That’s pretty much more vulnerable than you were with me, at any stage when we were together. You get that, right?”

I smile wryly. “Well, I didn’t know how to do that, before.”

“No, you sure didn’t,” she replies, and I feel she doesn’t really need to say it so passionately.

I’m sure as hell no expert at it, and I never will be. But I can do it with my mom, now; and I can do it with this couple I’m friends with at Irvine: the guy I dorm with, and his girl, because we hang out a lot and it’s pretty much thanks to them, or to _her,_ that I started to learn how to, and also how to be friends with chicks, I guess. It’s also thanks to them, or thanks mainly to Heather, that I went back to college after I dropped out.

But those few have been about it until the other night, with that kinda talk, not even Bobby, because that’s not our thing, and that’s fine. It’d be weird if we started it now. We don’t need that, and nothing will ever change that he’s my best friend.

But for some reason, it came real natural with Ali in particular, then, like it would’ve been harder _not_ to do it.

“I mean, I can’t argue with what you’re saying.”

She smiles and goes on, “You were much more familiar with where your fists were back then, than your mouth and your brain, let’s be realistic.”

I think defensively that she should probably remember, she quite liked what I did with my mouth when I used to kiss her, but I obviously keep that thought to myself.

“Right.”

She asks, in a joking way, “You’re not doing that stuff anymore, are you?”

“Beating up neighbourhood kids? Nah. I’ve put my thug days behind me.”

“I’m glad. And I guess that probably brings me to what I agreed to talk about.”

She sighs heavily, and comes to a stop. She watches the waves for a bit, drawing deep lines in the wet sand with her toes, and letting the seawater fill them up. I wait quietly, knowing and hating how much I need to hear what she’s gonna tell me, how important this moment is for me.

I don’t stare at her, since I hardly think that will help her.

She begins, “Looking back, it was doomed from the start. He and I fought. A lot. One of us would always lose their temper about something, and then we wouldn’t talk for days, or maybe a week or two, and then we’d make up.”

“Sounds a bit like us,” I suggest reluctantly. “That last spring.”

“Exactly, but with him, we were like that right from the start. I mean…” She glances at me and bites the inside of her cheek. “With you and me… our early fights weren’t really fights.”

I know what she’s getting at, and also why she’s trying not to seem like it’s a fond memory for her, why she’s not looking at me anymore, because I guess she doesn’t _want_ to have that particular kind of fond memory of us.

But I’m pretty sure she enjoyed it as much as I did, our bickering, because occasionally it required us… _really_ making up, using whatever means we were up to physically in our relationship at that point. Sometimes, it was even exactly what led to a new thing we started to do. It also certainly didn’t take days or weeks for us to wanna make up. Try hours, usually.

And Ali’s right; that was very different to how things went when the arguments became real, nearer the end. I’m to blame for that, because I was so angry then, not at her, but just always with this rage not far below the surface, and it ruined nearly everything in my life.

She goes on, “You and I – you and I had a good year, much more than a year, before it started to go mostly like that. It wasn’t messed up the whole time, but with him, it really didn’t take long to go that way.”

I guess it’s shitty of me, but with these few sentences, I feel on top of the fucking world. After such a long wait, I never imagined I’d hear _this._

I must not smile. I know that. It’s _real_ fucking important I remember that, right now.

Because Ali’s basically admitting she and I were better, than they were, together, at least for some, or maybe a lot, of the time. I can’t help that that’s like the best music my ears could hear.

“So what did you get mad at him about?” I fish hopefully. “Was it like, one thing, or lots of different ones?”

She gives me a closed expression, and then starts walking back where we’ve come from, back down the beach, forcing me to follow her to keep up.

“I’m not telling you that.”

“Okay, fine,” I say easily. “How about him?”

There’s literally no way I can stop myself wanting to know more details, the kinda things, anything, that might ease just the edges off the heartache I had. This is my one chance, even though I can maybe admit it’s not necessarily real healthy to dig deeper in this.

“Oh, you know. Just anything. Could be jealousy, for example, if he thought I had the hots for someone, which was always like, totally random and off-base. He just had this huge chip on his shoulder about all kinds of things, like, real insecurity. I guess I should’ve felt sorry for him, and I did, for a while, but it got really tiring having to defend myself all the time, and reassure him. Seriously.”

I nod, sympathetically I think, or hope, and it is genuine in the sense that I really care a lot that she went through a bad time, but there’s also that awesome feeling I get from hearing someone pull him down and expose his flaws. I can’t resist it, and I don’t try very hard to.

I’ll wait until later on to really enjoy that part of what she’s said, since I’m not going to hurt her.

When I’m at home, by myself, it’ll be like unwrapping a present, and I will savor it.

But she’s still got more. “But he’s also really egotistical. I honestly think he finds it hard to imagine what it’s like for anyone else, see their point of view, and he used to take everything personally. Even for a teenage guy, he’s dramatic. He’s a hothead.”

She sighs deeply, in a way that I know she’s finished.

So I say, “I’m real sorry that happened to you.” I’m feeling risky, clearly, because I shoot her a glance. “Sounds like a shitty boyfriend.”

“Don’t start,” she says tightly.

“What? You don’t believe I care?”

She huffs a little. “Why do I get the feeling that you loved hearing everything I just said?”

“Ali, come on. Do you really think I want anyone to hurt you?”

A frown creeps onto her face, and that line between her brows appears. “No…” she says, but not as convincingly as I’d like.

“So, can’t I, like, tell you I’m sorry that happened?”

“Like a friend, huh?”

“Right.”

“Sure it’s not something a boyfriend might try? Or someone who’s thinking about trying to be a boyfriend?”

“We’ve been over that. I can’t win with you, can I? Do you _want_ me to be an asshole?”

“It’s not that, exactly. But when you are, I know where I stand. At the moment, I’m… it’s still hard to recognise you, when you say that kinda stuff.”

“Well, I haven’t cut off my balls, so relax. You’re a cool chick, I’m a changed man. We’re friends. What’s the problem?”

I can feel her watching me for a few seconds, probably weighing the truth of my words. “No problem, I guess.”

“Well, good. Hey… you know when you said he was a hothead, just now… you called me that, too.”

“I did.”

“So, the guys you’ve seen since, they hotheads too?”

“I’m not sure I wanna talk to you about that.”

“Okay. It’s just, well. I guess I always thought of you as a firecracker. But in my case, it was what first drew me to you.”

There’s a wistful look for a moment, but then I think she remembers I’m there and it disappears. “That day at the movies, right?”

“Right. So my question is, you keep picking these guys with a temper, or dramatic like LaRusso, and then…”

“And then?”

I raise my eyebrows meaningfully. “And then you act like you’re surprised, if they fly off the handle.”

Her lips go tight, and I can see the spikes might come out if I’m not careful. “I would appreciate it if you would shut up now.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Seriously, zip it,” she says warningly, but we both know I’m exactly right. Oh, how _much_ that must bother her.

I laugh silently for a few seconds. “So…”

“Oh my god, this guy just isn’t gonna stop talking, is he?”

“Am I dramatic and selfish, too?”

“Sometimes!” she says hotly.

“Gee, thanks.”

“Hey, you asked.”

I grin. “I guess I did.”

We’re pretty much back at Jimmy’s when Susan and Barbara come walking up the beach to us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ll point out that I think Johnny and Ali both sense that the beach fight is going to require a much deeper conversation, in order to put behind them, but I don’t think either of them were _remotely_ ready for that tonight. It’s going to come when they get there.


	7. Wednesday 3, Part 3: Shirts on Skins

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I guess we’re past the 1/3 mark, because the last chapter is an epilogue, and shorter, although is _so_ important it basically functions as the last chapter. I’m kind of obsessed with it <3\. And we’re moving closer to halfway in wordcount, cos we’re heading for around 63k.
> 
> Thank you for reading!!!! Loving hearing from you guys about it XD Susan has her heart in the right place: she would’ve seen close-up the effects on Ali of some of Johnny’s biggest fuck ups. She’s also super not over being hurt by the break-up with Tommy, not now that she's near him again. So it’s not so fun for her being around him/the guys, but we don't get a close look at that, from Johnny's POV. I feel for her, even if Johnny doesn't get any of that, or understand it's happening. But I get the feelings she’s stirring for some of you, too - I don’t want Johnny to have to deal with anyone’s shit either, haha. Each of the main-ish characters has an arc in the story, and what will Susan’s be??? Stay tuned for more. I really don't want to give everything away here.
> 
> Also, I suspect that writing this scene might have been what set me off into writing my… series.

“Everything okay?” Susan asks immediately, giving me a quick once over. “Thought we’d better make sure he wasn’t causing any trouble.”

Ali gives a laugh. “No trouble. We just lost track of time, talking, that’s all.”

I notice Barbara’s got a soccer ball under her arm. Before Susan can bitch at us any more, I ask Barbara, “You been playing?”

“Nah, not really. A few of us were kicking around.”

Obviously not with Bobby, I think, since he’s sitting down with a group over there on the sand, but a couple other people are standing around in a cluster with their sweaters off.

I look at Ali. “What do you say?”

“Sure.”

“No thanks,” Susan says, before anyone can ask.

Barbara looks like she was about to say she’s in, but now isn’t sure she should. “Will you play with us?” I ask her with a smile.

She fixes her long hair, which is up in a high ponytail, with one of her delicately long arms. “I guess I can.”

It looks like Ali has noticed my friend, and is finally willing to help me out.

“Hey, Bobby!” she calls. “We’re gonna play, girls onto guys. Wouldn’t be right without you.”

That seems very unwise, for the girls, but I shut my mouth, so I don’t make Ali mad.

In the torchlight, Bobby turns and sees the four of us. He throws me this look of amazement, which turns quickly into a smile as he gets to his feet.

He jogs over. “Sounds great.”

I look at Barbara, who is shooting a silent accusation at Ali, which makes me wonder what they talk about together, but Ali’s pretending she doesn’t see it.

I draw in a breath and say to her, “Bobby made varsity. You should probably know.”

She shoves me again and says lightly, “I wasn’t talking about a serious game, c’mon.” But Ali’s never done a not-serious game in her life, so that’s bullshit. She’s so competitive that I’ve seen her sulk when she loses, much like I have myself at some things.

Tommy is dragging Erin over, which doesn’t surprise me, since he most likely wants to get a closer look at what’s going on with me over here.

“You don’t mind if we join?”

Susan realises this is now nothing that she is gonna be able to stop, and also she has no wish to stay where Tommy now is, so she gives her friends a look down her nose and leaves us, going to sit down in the sand.

Barbara and Ali exchange a glance, and Ali shrugs at her, sort of like, come on, it’s no big deal.

“Three on three,” Bobby says, and he’s already drawing up some lines.

“Last warning?” I say to Ali, since I know Bobby won’t brag about his own skills.

“What, you afraid some girls might beat you?” she counters.

Looking into her face, I suddenly realise, dreadfully: she’s created a test for him. And maybe for me, too, who knows.

If we trounce them into the sand, that will be a fail. If we go easy on them and patronise them and let them win, that will also be a failure. The only possible acceptable way will be if we somehow find a middle ground between the two, a convincing one, and I hope to god Bobby is aware of this, or we might all be screwed.

We start taking off jackets and sweaters, and tossing them to the sidelines.

“You can keep going, if you like,” Erin says suggestively to Tommy, and he throws me a victorious smirk when she puts her hands around him to hold him, reaching into the back pockets of his jeans.

“Shirts on skins?” he says, staring to pull his shirt off while she runs her hand up his chest.

“You gonna be able to keep your mind on the game?” I taunt him, as I reach up behind my back to tug my t-shirt off. I toss in into the clothing pile, and then we line up down in one half of the small field. Bobby’s gotten hold of the ball, and he passes it to Ali, so they can start in possession.

Barbara looks unsure, but Erin’s bending forward, ready, and it’s not long until I realise she must be sporty.

Ali starts up the field toward me, watching me in between dribbling, and she passes it off to her friend while I’m busy forgetting I’m not here just to stare at her.

“Hello?” Bobby calls, because Erin nearly gets past me, and Bobby’s running across to intercept her.

But I manage to take the ball on her way past, and slide it to Bobby, so that he can turn and keep running.

Tommy cheers when it floats over the marks Bobby’s made for a goal, and so we let the girls start again.

I try to shoot Bobby a look, in case he hasn’t realised what the actual game here is, but it takes him a while to catch on.

I convincingly fumble a pass from Tommy near their goal, and Ali is able to make it count, thank god, because I can only do that so often.

“Woo!” Erin calls out, and she runs up to Tommy. She stretches up on her toes and kisses him on the cheek, and her shapely calf muscles go tight. Surely she must be cold wearing such tiny denim shorts, but girls are like that. I see him slap her on the back of the thigh when she runs back to their side. I no longer have any doubt they’re an item then, for now.

It’s kinda impossible for us not to score a couple goals after that, and then Bobby does a relatively believable trip, when he’s trying to find free space, and Erin’s there to take the ball and give it to Barbara. She’s probably got the least obvious experience, but she’s agile and fit, and starts up the field. I allow Ali to delay me, dodging to the wrong side, and again, pretending I can’t see her telegraph her feints.

I feel myself getting drawn into the way she smiles, plotting, at the ground, occasionally looking to see where I am, although she won’t look me in the eyes, and I follow the movement when she tucks her hair behind her ear.

By now we’re drawing a crowd of maybe twelve, sitting on the sidelines, pretty much everyone who was down on the beach, and there’s a lot of cheering when Barbara gets a goal.

I use the cover of noise to run past Bobby and I mutter derisively, “Are you getting it, yet?”

He turns to reply, “Of course, but _how_?”

“Right,” I hear Aaron call out, from the audience. “Skins has a varsity player. How about we level this a bit?”

“Sure,” Bobby says with barely hidden relief.

“You okay if we join their team?”

By now Greg is standing up too, and suddenly it’s got the possibility of going very much the other way, with five onto three, especially cos I remember Greg making the school team when he was a sophomore.

“Go for it,” I say, because at least now we don’t have to hold back; Bobby can do his thing.

Ali’s eyes are shining at me, and I realise, fuck, she _knew_ we were faking, didn’t she? And now she thinks I’m gonna regret it, because we will lose for real. Well, I guess we’ll see about that.

Bobby’s come to life as we spread out throughout the field, but I’m sure he won’t forget Barbara’s out here, and he’ll have his eyes on that bigger prize, I think.

He wants me to start with the ball, and I take a diagonal as I size Aaron up, ducking away from his attack and coming around him to run up the sand. Greg’s cutting across to meet me in a few steps, so I kick it to Tommy, where he’s waiting back across the field, who is able to run with it far enough to draw both Greg and Aaron, and give Bobby time to slot into place and take an easy goal when he receives the ball.

That was an important one, as far as bragging rights go, and the three of us run up for high fives, and Tommy throws some sarcastic commiseration to the other team.

The trash talk starts up immediately after that, of course.

Ali and Erin hang back and pass across to each other a few times. They can’t do it with Bobby’s precision, not even twenty percent of it, but few people I know can get anywhere close to him, and they’re doing pretty well.

“Give us a call when you’re ready to play?” Bobby calls.

“We’re ready,” Aaron replies, as he takes the pass and runs forward. Back to Greg, and then Bobby’s in the way preventing a pass back to Aaron, so Barbara gets the ball sent her way, and she stops it and starts up the field.

Bobby approaches, sizing her up, and she’s watching him guardedly. “Where you going with that?” he risks.

“Into the goal,” she says defiantly, and I see her look him right in the face, her reddish blonde hair swirling from its ponytail.

It’s a solid play, because he doesn’t realise she’s passed it to Greg, until the ball is long gone. There are cheers after three seconds.

She raises an eyebrow at him, and he stares after her as she jogs back.

As much as I’m happy for him getting some attention, it’d be great if he didn’t forget we now have five opponents.

Tommy ends up having to take care of the two guys with me, and Bobby is left to it to dart among the girls. Sometimes, the girls get it right, and sometimes they don’t, and Bobby’s putting on a pretty great show with trick shots, and side-kicks behind his calf, and we’re entertaining the crowd.

Once we’ve got a lead, I figure we proved our point. We’re sweating with how much work we’ve had to do, and when Tommy puts his arm around me and squeezes the back of my neck when we get a goal, I can feel the heat coming from him. Whenever Bobby runs over to grab his shirt, to wipe his face, a number of girls on the side give him the once over, and I’m very sure Barbara did once, too, even if she was caught between a frown and a smile when she did it.

I push my sweaty hair off my face, and decide to change my focus.

I start to go after Ali, which she notices real quick, and she tells me to get lost.

“Pick on someone your own size,” she begs, laughing, when I get into her space.

She’s smiling down at the ground again, or sideways, anywhere but right at me, and I let it take longer than I need so she doesn’t feel bad when I extract the ball from between her legs.

When I’m running back after the goal I score, I throw her a smirk which makes her roll her eyes and swear payback.

*

When we sit down afterwards, the players are all pretty puffed, and someone passes us water, and then a drink, which is nice and cool, and then I’m lying back on the sand, aware that this is going to make it stick to my back, but I’ll deal with it later.

Susan throws daggers at Tommy, and then goes inside, but Barbara stays down on the beach.

Jennifer only came at the last minute, and she’s disappointed to have missed the match, by the sounds.

“You could have told me,” she’s chiding Barbara. “I’ve been inside helping Jimmy with a bunch of idiots who are doing a drinking game that is not going to end well. This looks like it was way more fun.”

“Hey, sorry,” Barbara says. “You could’ve cheered for us.”

“Did you win?”

“Yeah, we did.” Barbara throws me a glance which makes me uncomfortable, because I think it is suspicion, so I look around to work out where Ali’s at, instead.

She’s actually coming over to me from Aaron, and I sit partly up on my elbows to look up at her.

“Hey,” she says, and softly kicks my foot. “Next time, if you want it to be believable, you’re gonna have to let us win from the start.”

“Who says we let you win?”

“So that’s how you’re gonna play it, huh?”

I stare innocently up at her. “No idea what you’re talking about.”

I can’t catch her eye; she’s staring down at the sand, and not at me, but she’s smiling. “Hey, I’m gonna go. Do you have any idea how late it is?”

“Shit,” I say, when my watch tells me two A.M.

“The next party’s gonna be the last real one before Christmas. Cos I won’t be able to come for long on Christmas Eve. We’re going to church, late.”

“Oh?” I’m inevitably disappointed at future lost time hanging out with her, given we only have the winter, and also wondering why she’s telling me about it.

“Yeah. So I’ll see you on Saturday?”

“Of course.”


	8. Saturday 3: Progress Report

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked the Bobby/Barbara update last chapter. We move back to Dutch and Tina now, and then a main focus on Johnny and Ali. If you haven’t found my tumblr yet, the blog is the same as my user name. Sometimes I post stuff relevant to Malibu there (there’s a tag), although it can get messy/feels too haha. Stop by for a look, and even better if you want to say hi :)
> 
> Thanks so much for your words, which continue to give me life. It’s amazing to hear that you enjoy this, really appreciated. Thank for reading. This is another biggie. Hope it really, really works for you.
> 
> KingKarate has written a fic in this universe, starting in Chapter 2, Tina's POV. It’s called “Rising Tide”. It started as a minific and is now so much more. You should definitely go read it, because it’s AWESOME XD I'm still screaming about it. Although try to keep the dates concurrent with what you read here, or SPOILERS! Thank you so much!!!! I'll also be posting one stand-alone sometime of Tina's POV. WE LOVE HER. TEAM TINA.

It’s the next party, and when we’re sitting and watching the game, on beanbags around the TV on the back wall of the room, it’s me, Dutch, Tommy, Greg and Tina. No one seems to have questioned her presence, and her talk fits in so naturally with ours that you forget pretty quickly, anyway.

When Steve joins, last, Dutch even introduces her, which throws me.

“Oh, hey,” he says. “Steve, you know Tina?”

“Sure. Hey,” he says to her.

Holy fuck, Dutch is actually seeing her as a person who he respects. He’s a strange dude, so hard and yet so easy to crack if you know how to. Now I just gotta make sure he sees her as a girl, too, which might be more difficult.

“Hey.” She’s shuffling her beanbag a little closer to Dutch, so Steve can get a spot in the semicircle.

At one stage, I see her take her jacket off, and put it down on the carpet. Underneath she’s got a sleeveless grey t-shirt on, exposing her shoulders, and the shirt only just comes down to the top of her ripped black jeans. Curvy is really the only word any guy would use about her body, meaning things go in and other things go out, pretty far out, where guys like them to.

When she stretches her arms up behind her head, and laces them to lean back into, I realise she’s got some strength in her, because her arms are pretty defined for a chick. She’s got some noticeable muscle groups, although not huge arms or anything, and I’m impressed. She doesn’t have a tan, but you barely notice, and her stomach is very flat, and maybe even toned. I try not to look too much at where her shirt has pulled up, but it’s good to know she’s got something to work with.

I have to stifle a laugh when Dutch turns to her instinctively.

He’s intent on watching a play, but at the same time, he must sense female flesh, because his head turns while his eyes stay on the TV for a second or two, and then they flick to her, and I have to look away because I don’t really want to watch him checking out her body.

She doesn’t break, just keeps her eyes on the game and pretends not to notice, even though I wonder if by now Dutch has realised you can see a little bit of the skin on her rather strong looking thighs through the rips in her jeans.

Maybe I don’t have so much work left to do after all.

*

Once it’s clear we aren’t going to win the game, we break up and start to mingle.

We let Jimmy make the announcement about the karate, even though I’d already mentioned it to Barbara to keep my word. Everyone’s so spread out these days, and the groups so mixed, he has to visit a few locations, including the car park near Dutch’s car, to make sure everyone knows that there will be an extra get together on Monday at night, partly because some people can’t come on Christmas Eve, but mostly because there’s going to be karate to watch, for anyone who’s interested.

The five of us have talked about how it might work, and agreed to wear our old black gis, since they were always by far the coolest, let’s be honest. I suspect I’m not the only one who’s been doing some training in the few days since we made the plan, although none of us are going to admit that to each other.

The funny thing is, my friends don’t know I’ve actually been doing that off and on since the summer, in my own time, since I haven’t been able to find anywhere I wanna go, a dojo. Not more than a few times a week, but I have been. If none of the guys have, if they’re out of practice, it’s going to be a whitewash, although I won’t be cruel about it.

It’s a little later on when Courtney starts hanging off Dutch while he stands in a little group, and laughing flirtily at his jokes.

She offers him a sip from her beer, and when he puts an arm around her, my heart sinks for Tina.

I’m honestly starting to root for the girl, because she deserves something after what he puts her through. If she keeps on sticking around, she’s clearly got the patience of a saint or the determination of a tidal wave, maybe both.

I can’t see Ali anywhere, so it’s a fifty-fifty guess. I’m right on the first one, because she’s up on the deck.

She’s sitting with a blanket around her shoulders, because tonight is a lot cooler out, and I sit down with her, knowing that by now, I’m allowed to sit comfortably closer.

“So there’s good and bad news,” I begin, because our shared project is just the best imaginable excuse to keep talking to her, and it’s gonna be such a shame when it’s over. Perhaps I should sabotage it, so that doesn’t happen too quickly. But on the other hand. I think we’ve still got time up our sleeves where Barbara is concerned.

Bobby’s taken to offering to get her and the girls a drink, or ‘anything you need?’ starting the other night after the game, so we’ll see if that makes any difference.

Ali looks expectant.

“Dutch knows that your friend is of the female species,” I announce proudly.

“You’re kidding?” She smiles wildly in disbelief.

“Oh, he knows real bad,” I assure her, and then remind myself Ali isn’t gonna wanna know the details guys think about, so I leave it at that.

“So, does that mean it’s a matter of time?”

I shake my head slightly. “Maybe, not gonna be tonight, though. Dutch has just found a friend.”

Ali frowns in disgust. “Seriously? He can’t even take a night off?”

I chuckle lightly. “I’m sorry. What can I say? You know what he’s like.” I grimace a little. “Assuming Tina wants to wait in the line, it may well happen, although I’m not totally sure yet.”

Ali looks disappointed. “I… I wondered if, maybe cos they were starting to be friends, she might have a shot at more than just that.”

I sigh. “Again, you know what he’s like. Better not to get your hopes up.”

“Your friend is also getting some progress.”

“You mean, you finally did something?” I’m shooting her a teasing smile.

“Shut _up_. You have no idea how hard I’ve been working on her to convince her he’s not the bad guy she’s been thinking. And besides, have you even thanked me for the soccer game? That was my idea, you know.”

“No, it wasn’t,” I say, outraged. “I asked you, remember?”

She waves me away. “Well, I asked Bobby. That’s what counts.”

I sigh at her to let her know I’m only gonna let this go because I don’t wanna argue, and not because she’s right.

“So?” I ask.

“So what?”

“You said there was progress?”

Ali bites back this little smile. “Tommy’s stroke of genius did it. Turns out, Barbara can’t resist a pretty face, or body, as the case may be.”

“She said that?”

“She didn’t have to. She’s said enough that I know she doesn’t mind him in that way at _all_ , and in fact, I’m pretty sure she must have already thought about it before, because she gave off a vibe of owning up to a dirty secret to me. So it’s just the other stuff he’s gotta work on, but don’t underestimate how important that is to her.”

“He’s trying do some favors, and he said he’s gonna try to get to talk to her tonight, properly.”

“Well, I wish him the best of luck. I hope for his sake he doesn’t give up easily.”

I smile ahead of us. “He won’t. He wouldn’t quit going on about how she looked during the game, to me, either.”

The crease line between her eyebrows appears. “I still hope he’s after more than just that, from her.”

“Trust me, if he’s trying this hard, he’s after way more than that.”

“Good. She hasn’t been out with many guys, and I don’t want her hurt.”

I slip down in my chair a bit and get more comfortable.

“You don’t wanna get a blanket?” she asks, looking down at my sweater and then quickly away again. “There’s a stack inside.”

“I’m good. Did I see you doing a flip on the beach earlier?”

She nods and winces. “I probably shoulda warmed up a bit, but Jennifer and Barbara wanted to teach me some moves.”

“Bobby was there?”

“Yes, we had an audience, and he was in it.”

I’m sure I will hear about _that_ later on. Kid’s probably off with dreamy eyes still, I imagine.

“You still got it,” I tell her.

“Thanks,” she says shyly, “but I wasn’t really joking about the warming up thing.” She reaches down to rub her back and gives me a sheepish grin.

“Hey… just to wrap up that topic from the other night. What I heard was that we’re settled that I was a better boyfriend than LaRusso, right?”

She laughs quietly, but her shoulders start shaking. “Funny, I don’t remember saying that. _At all_.”

She’s got a nerve smiling at me like that when I’m not allowed to hit on her, but I’m not surprised she’s willing to torture me like that.

I make a dismissive gesture. “Details. It was in between the lines. We were good together, for a long time, until we weren’t.”

“Right.”

I stare at her, shocked. “You agree?”

She reaches out and hits me on the arm for that. “That much, I’ll admit to.”

*

That night she calls me.

I’m in my bedroom, and I’ve been home about twenty minutes when my private line rings once, and I jump onto the phone before it can wake everyone in the house.

“Hello?” I say questioningly, wondering who would ring me after one in the morning.

“So, you still have the same number,” says her voice. It sounds exactly how it used to on the phone, and I sit down on my bed, bewildered, and fall onto my back.

“Ali?”

“Yeah. Were you asleep?”

“Nah.”

“Is it okay that I called?”

“Of course.”

“I didn’t have to look it up,” she tells me, and gives a little laugh. “Must have dialled it too many times to forget.”

I say her number to her as a reply, and she laughs again.

“We used to spend hours on the phone, didn’t we?” she says.

“Yeah, every night after school, pretty much.”

“I wonder what we even used to find to talk about.”

I realise I’ve closed my eyes, and settled into a familiar, much-missed action automatically, as if no time has gone by in between.

“Whatcha want?” I ask.

“Oh,” she says, “I’m just calling up to check if I still got the right number.” I can tell she’s joking by the way she says it. “I’m gonna hang up, now.”

“Okay, good night, then,” I play along.

After a pause, I say, “You didn’t hang up.”

“No.”

I’m sure she does actually have a point, and I’m comfortable to wait in silence, imagining where she might be sitting, on her end, remembering what her house is like. I’m not gonna ask her; it seems like the question you say right before you ask what they’re wearing, and I don’t think Ali rang me for that kind of phone call. I smile to myself, as I unwillingly recall once or twice when we did.

“Johnny?” she says.

“Yeah?”

“I figure I want to tell you my side of what happened between you and I. The things I wish I hadn’t done, too. I keep thinking about it every time I see you, and I know it’s gonna bother me until I tell you. I think it will be good, maybe help us to finish drawing the line under the past, now that we’re friends, and we have a future.”

“I’m listening,” I say softy, and I roll over onto my stomach and cradle the phone with my shoulder.

“Number one,” she says, “probably same as one of yours. It would have been good if we’d known how to grow up together properly, especially when we were arguing about the real stuff. We’d still be an item, so I regret that we both helped to ruin it. Because back when it was good, it was really good.”

I’m shocked, _stunned_ , that she’s willing to admit that to me. Even if she thought it, especially the part about both of us doing some things we shouldn’t have, I would have assumed she’d fiercely protect the knowledge, rather than hand it to me.

I have the terrible feeling I’m gonna do something really lame after this call, like remember her saying _it was really good,_ and picture it, picture the words coming out of her mouth, which I’m starting to do right now.

“Johnny?” she asks, probably wanting to check in, since I didn’t say anything.

“Sorry. I just…” I sigh. “It was, and we did, and you’re right,” I say in reverse order.

“Number two. I’m sorry I moved on so quickly. I mean, I didn’t know you were gonna turn up that night and see me talking to a guy I’d only met a few hours before, but you woulda found out sooner or later, if I was seeing Daniel after that. I mean, we didn’t start officially for a while, but it did kinda start then; I went after him. It was too soon, and it was a mistake for my own sake, but I’m also sorry it hurt you. A few weeks wasn’t long enough to wait after two years.”

I just lie there, trying to make my voice sound relaxed. “Okay.”

“There’s no excuse for what you did at the beach party,” she says quickly, and I can imagine the look I’d be getting if I could see her, right now. I can _hear_ it.

“I know that.”

“But I guess, I kinda get it, even if I wish you hadn’t.”

“I wished that I hadn’t done any of that, every day, for months and months, after. Felt like the biggest mistake I ever made. I’m really sorry.”

“You… it must have been hard for you to see the two of us. I guess you thought we were getting together, even though that didn’t happen quite yet.”

“Hard’s not really a strong enough word. I mean, you broke my heart a few weeks before, and I’m not saying I didn’t deserve it. But that night, I just felt, like, _sick_. Shit, Ali, it hurt me real bad, cos it was like this big shock, right outta the blue, and it seemed like you guys were into each other, but it was outta nowhere for me, when I rode up and saw you with him.

“Like, I couldn’t even see straight. I wanted to lash out at this guy who was all in your space, even more because I could see on your face that you didn’t mind him being there. I mean, the whole reason I rode down was to try to talk to you again, to apologise again, and try to get you back, but instead, I saw you guys and then acted like an asshole.” The breath I draw hurts a bit, because I’m back in the moment.

“I could feel you slipping away from me. I think that’s when I mighta realised that we were finished, that we were over for good. I don’t think I’ve ever felt more jealous, and I doubt I ever will.” I swallow. “But - I’m still really sorry for what how I acted.”

“I know,” says her soft voice. “I can get that, I guess. I accept your apology, if you accept mine.”

“Of course I do.” I’m staring at my curtains, almost unable to recognise what I’m looking at, because of how it feels to have Ali say that.

I’ve always wondered if that was the stupidest day of my life, because it sure seemed to fuck up nearly everything for me for the next long while. Lots of that, I can’t do anything about, now.

But Ali has accepted my saying I’m sorry about what I did.

I’m not sure there’s anything else she could possibly say that would mean more to me, than what just happened.

“Johnny?” I hear, and I can tell by her voice, that she must have already said it, maybe more than once.

“Yeah, sorry. I’m here.”

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just... I never thought you’d forgive me for that, that’s all. It was such a shitty thing to do.”

“We all make mistakes. I can tell how much you regret it.”

I _hate_ that my eyes are feeling warm, and I dig my fingernails into my palm, hard, to change my focus onto that, instead.

“Number three,” she goes on. “I was a bitch to you after that. I shouldn’t have been so mean to you, every time you tried to talk to me at school.”

“That’s okay, I deserved it,” I have to admit.

“You did. But… I knew it was hurting you when I did it. When I teased you, or talked to Daniel in front of you. I was cruel, and I did it on purpose.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah. Maybe I shoulda put that one at number one.” Her voice has gone meek. “I’m sorry… that I did that to you.”

I’m silent again, forced into thinking about it. It’s weird because it feels like it’s just happened or something, because she’s only just telling me now.

I can remember a few of those conversations. I was bugging her. I shouldn’t have, I know. I wish to god I’d known better, but to know she decided to twist my feelings to get back at me stings me with surprising pain, like when someone you trust turns around and betrays you.

It fucking hurts, something physical, not that different to the way it used to hurt when I knew I’d lost her.

“Johnny?” she eventually says, a shake in her voice.

“I’m still here,” I say, hearing how my own sounds thick.

“I’m really sorry.”

I can deal with this, I’m sure, but it will take me a little while, because of how fresh it is. I’m not sure if I’m glad she decided to tell me, but if she needed to get it off her chest, I can understand that.

I say quietly, “How can I not forgive you, when you’ve forgiven me for so much?”

She makes a sound that for one second makes me wonder if she was crying, but then there’s no more of it that I can hear, so I must’ve imagined it.

“You forgive me?”

“Of course, like I said. Just, I… didn’t know that, that you had done that.”

“Have I hurt you?”

I swallow a lump in my throat, but I don’t think she’d want me to lie. “Yeah. It’s okay, though.”

“You don’t have to say it’s okay. I wish I could take it back.”

“I know the feeling.”

I listen to her breathing for a few moments, and wonder why exactly she wanted to tell me this over the phone, and why tonight, but I can’t come up with anything convincing.

“I’ve got a number four,” she says, and I wonder if I need to brace myself, but her voice sounds lighter again. “But I’m not going to tell you.”

“Hey,” I begin, grateful for the chance to move away from those painful feelings. “That’s so not fair. You know that, right? Why even tell me?”

“I thought you’d want to know there was another one.”

I roll my eyes. “Liar. You just want me to suffer, as usual.”

I can hear the smile in her voice. “A lady has her secrets. Anyway, I’m gonna go to sleep now, so good night.”

“Well, good night, I guess, but I want you to know it’s still not okay to hold out on me like that. Guess you’ll sleep real peacefully now, while I lie here and my mind goes crazy.”

She laughs softly. “I’m sorry. Try to sleep.”

“Night, Ali.”


	9. Monday, Part 1: Wanna Ride

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We’re making progress, hey :)
> 
> Extra party night = pretty different party! It starts with a location change, and then the second half of this is kind of fun and light, and brings the Cobras back together, and the whole party groups back together; it also leads into Monday, Part 2, and I’m assuming by now you realise that none of these chapters are in here by accident XD
> 
> Thank you for reading, and thank you so much for your comments which are just always amazing to read. The new kudos made me really smile, thank you :) Hope you like this one.

We go riding on Monday.

There’s us five and Tina, and Steve, and Freddy who now rides, even though I don’t remember that from high school.

Jennifer’s with Jimmy, Tommy’s got Erin, and Steve’s got this beach blonde girl, Meredith, on the back of their bikes, but I can’t think of a way I can possibly casually get Ali along, so I don’t try.

We end up going to Malibu Creek State Park after lunch, and there’s some great straight stretches up near the Ranch where we pretty much start doing races, while the other three girls sit by the roadside.

Tina holds her own real well, even if she’s not the fastest, which to be fair, she couldn’t be, with her bike, compared to some of the ones we all have. She stops at the side of the road, where we’re all milling about, some still on bikes, and kicks the stand out and climbs off. When she takes off her helmet and ruffles up her fringe so it’s standing up again, Dutch pulls up next to her.

She's pulled her gloves off, so she can clean her glasses with her t-shirt, and she puts them back on her face to look at him.

I see him considering her, and then he says, “Would you like to ride my bike?”

She sits down lightly onto her own seat and crosses her arms.

“With or without you on it?”

He grins. “I guess either, but I meant you can have a go. See how fast you go on a proper bike.”

“Don’t listen to him,” she says, and pats her black 350. “He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

If there have ever been two people more made for each other, I’m yet to see it, and surely, Dutch is going to have to realise it. It’s so fucking obvious, it’s painful.

“So… that’s a no?” He looks disappointed somehow.

She stands up. “Didn’t say that. You sure you don’t mind?”

“Nah, go for it.”

She gives him a playful look of scorn. “You’re not worried I’ll crash your bike?”

“You won’t. If you didn’t crash during that police chase, you’re not gonna crash on this road.”

My eyes widen slightly, and I catch both Bobby and Tommy looking at me with the same expression.

Everyone’s kinda come to listen, since none of us can remember Dutch ever letting anyone on his bike before, not by themselves.

When it becomes clear she’s going to, we take positions sitting or lying down in the grass, but if Tina is nervous about having us watching, you’d never know.

She clips her helmet back on, and puts the visor down and steps up to the bike, gloves back on.

Dutch moves away, with an open-handed gesture.

Right away I can tell she must have ridden different bikes before, cos she knows exactly what she’s doing. She roars off, within a handful of seconds doing far over the speed limit, and she’s a dark shape up the road until we hear the whine of the engine slowing as she turns to come back.

Dutch comes over to sit next to where I’m lying, and we watch as Tina zooms past us, up the other way, and hear the engine going through notes.

Dutch whistles appreciatively, and sits back on his elbows.

“What do you think?” he asks me.

“She’s great. She’s a good rider.”

“And uh…” Dutch throws a look over to Tommy, who’s a few people away, but given that he’s making out with Erin, I’m pretty sure he’s not paying any attention to us. Dutch says quietly, “Do you think she’s hot? Like, in a tomboy way?”

“Sure,” I agree casually, while I pretend there isn’t a somersault of victory inside me.

“Tommy doesn’t think so.”

“So what?”

Dutch smiles slightly and shrugs. “So, she’s pretty different as far as girls go. I wouldn’t have thought of her that way.”

“But?”

“But maybe, I started thinking of her that way. I feel like I could get into some trouble with her, my kinda trouble. We already did, in this drinking game the other night. ”

“I don’t doubt it for one second. Jimmy will round us up to keep an eye on you, I’m sure.”

He looks at me, not completely his confident self. “Would it be weird to go for a girl like that?”

“You want my permission, or what?”

“No,” he says, and I realise that’s actually not that far from what he does want; I think he’d prefer it if at least one of us backs him up.

“Dutch, I’ve never in my life seen a girl more perfect for you. If you don’t grab her, I’m going to spend every day of the future thinking you’re an idiot, and I’m going to remind you I’m thinking it.”

He breaks into a grin. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

I’m not going to talk to him about thinking about the fact that Tina might deserve more than approximately half an hour of alone time, or however long he usually spends. I wouldn’t be surprised if he works out she’s different, and if he doesn’t, there’s not much hope for him.

*

We ride back to Jimmy’s when it starts getting on in the afternoon, and I grab my gear from the room where we all left our bags, so I can get ready for tonight.

Jimmy’s moved the sofas all right out of the way to the edge of the room, and they’ve used chalk on the carpet, to mark out a square of the right size in the middle of the room. Obviously there's no sprung floor, but Jimmy's confident the floorboards have enough give for what we'll do, as long as we all remember not to go too hard that way. There’s plenty of space due to just how big this front room is, about double that area lengthways.

Once we’re ready, the five of us talk to people in here for a little while, answering questions about karate stuff or tonight, mostly, since everyone seems pretty excited. It’s the biggest group we’ve had, maybe everyone that’s come to any of the parties so far and a few new people, pushing for forty people or more.

I don’t get the chance to talk to Ali, but I know we will later on, so I don’t mind so much. At one point she glances across from her group and smiles at me, and I think she might be looking up at my headband. She seems relaxed though, and it’s a relief, I guess, to see that she isn’t uncomfortable about me wearing it, when she’s the one who gave it to me.

When Jimmy moves to stand alone, I realise we’re gonna start, so I nod goodbye at Connie and the guys we were with, and head over.

“Johnny?” Jimmy says to me, and I go stand in the middle of the square.

“We’re gonna have two tournaments tonight,” I tell the crowd. “The first one, I’m gonna ref these guys, and they’re gonna face off in pairs for eighteen matches, until they’ve all fought three times. Whoever gets the most wins, wins overall.”

“You’re not gonna fight?” Steve asks, clearly disappointed.

“I will, in the second. I’ll explain that one later.”

Jennifer’s drawn up a score on a big piece of cardboard, with four names, so she can make a tally.

“In the case of a draw in wins, it’ll be a sudden death final, first to a point.”

Everyone’s pretty much sitting on the carpet, although a few are standing at the back in the second row, and they all seem to know enough to have left us room around the square.

The guys go and sit on their knees, one in each corner, just out of the square.

I call Jimmy and Bobby first, and they bow, and pretty soon, I think all five of us forget we even have an audience.

Jimmy gives a laugh in Bobby’s face when he misses a kick he thought was sure to land, but Bobby only needs a few seconds to score the first point, and then it’s pretty on.

I’m using my hands, since we don’t have flags, and it takes a short time until I’ve given Bobby three points and declared him the winner.

Jimmy sighs, disappointed but unsurprised, and they slap hands before they return to their corners.

Jennifer makes the tally, and sets Bobby in the lead, which I assume will be how this goes.

When Dutch takes Tommy from his feet and chops down onto his shoulder blade, the room seems to celebrate with him, and he’s resetting, waiting for me to start them again.

I wonder if the audience can tell, the way I can, that they’re pretty rusty, even Bobby, but maybe it’s not obvious to a layman, because none of them are fully on top of it, so they don’t tend to expose the weakness of the other guy the fight.

It only takes them a couple matches each to ease back into it a bit more, and as I suspected, Bobby’s got this under control, with Dutch two behind on the board, but at least each of my friends score a match at some point.

I’m having so much fun right now, and I can’t believe we’ve been missing out on doing this together for so long. What’s _wrong_ with us?

I don’t have a lot of time to see who’s watching who, and what anyone in particular is making of it, although I do notice from Barbara’s tight, small smile, maybe Bobby wasn’t lying when he said they actually had a chat the other night, and it didn’t go terribly. She’s got her wall up though, still, with her arms crossed, but given how her eyes follow him, and not much else, I think Bobby might be starting to break though.

The crowd is really biased for their favorites, but luckily each of the guys has his own section, who pay each other out and get in each other’s faces, when whichever friend of mine they’re cheering for gets a point.

Ali seems to be having a great time in the center of her line of friends, and I think they’re all pretty divided on who they’re going for. I can hear Susan cheering, every time someone gets a point on Tommy, even if it’s Bobby, but I can at least say she smiles, and she looks like she might have worked out how to lighten up a bit.

When I’m holding up Bobby’s hand, with nine out of nine possible wins, everyone claps, and there’s a round of competing cheers and boos, and he’s grinning around the room.

The five of us come together in a group after that, and I look to Tommy.

He says, “Okay, so some of you might have noticed Johnny didn’t fight just now, but we’re not gonna let him get away with that, are we?”

He’s turning around while he talks, looking at everyone around the square, like we’re at a proper event, and I must admit there _is_ an atmosphere.

There’s an enthusiastic agreement, of, “No!”

“You guys wanna see some more action?”

“Yes!” they cheer back.

I look a question at Barbara, to see if she’s willing to go ahead still with the halftime show, and she smiles and rolls her eyes very slightly, shy, as she gets to her feet.

She’s wearing white cotton shorts and a t-shirt tonight, same as Jennifer, and the five of us step back to give them room.

They get some whistles, which Jimmy is pretending to look around for the source of, protectively, and I throw him a grin as we watch the girls pass each other with flips.

Jennifer plants her bent leg to the side so Barbara can climb up, and it seems effortless the way she gets up onto her shoulders. We all watch tensely when she lifts her feet up under her and stands up, not far from the hanging lights of the room, and then there’s a move they do in unison which has Barbara land lightly on her feet in front. Their display is met with a huge round of applause.

Bobby has a real stupid smile on his face when Barbara bounces past him, and then prepares a hand lift for Jennifer, which flips her backwards in the air.

I have to admit I’m impressed too, because most of what they did was difficult, and some of it, seems impossible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up: Johnny’s turn, and after that, other things :)


	10. Monday, Part 2: Hard Fought

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Complicated note here, to maximise your reading experience, so please read it all carefully before acting on any of it, haha. It’ll make everything better :)
> 
> 1) I’ve written a stand-alone story, one chapter long, which is available to read if you wish, and it occurs during this chapter of Malibu. It takes place from Tina’s POV, and has a very different tone to Malibu.
> 
> 2) You might choose to read it when you see this symbol **[X]** in the text of this chapter, and then return here for Malibu to continue in ways both related, and unrelated, to that stand-alone story. Or you might like to finish this chapter and then head over. Whatever works for you.
> 
> 3) Please, please **_don’t_** go read it until you hit that point **[X]** , as you’ll only lose some of the joy that leads to it.
> 
> 4) **If** you decide to read this other story I’ve mentioned, please read the end notes for this Chapter here first, but only WHEN you’re about to go read the other story
> 
> 5) To avoid **SPOILING YOURSELF** for both Malibu and that story, do nottttttttttttt read those end notes just yet.
> 
> There is a reason for these instructions.
> 
> Thanks always for reading and I appreciate your comments so _much_. Would love to hear what you thought of the things that happen at this party, because there ARE some things. <3 Enjoy!
> 
> I have added a new note up in the end notes, this time about the character **Samantha**. It might be needed? Not sure <333

My friends fight me one at a time, while the others sit on their knees, waiting.

After short bows, Dutch faces me first. We’re both bouncing loosely on our legs. He tests me by coming in for an easily predictable straight punch, two, and he thinks I can’t I can see him readying that reverse strike, which I block with my elbow, and step through to punch him in the shoulder. He growls in frustration and heads back to his corner, and Tommy comes in next.

He circles me, and then tries a back kick, but he leaves himself open after I dodge, and I sweep him to the floor.

As soon as I land a hit, my friends retire to their corner, and whoever’s next around the square heads in.

Once I’ve taken Bobby with a roundhouse kick, they speed up their re-entry, giving me less time to recover, but we go around three times, and then four, with me making contact before any of them can, or laying them out on the carpet and finishing with a strike.

I don’t humiliate them, but nor do I hold back. I think if anyone didn’t realise or remember why I had to sit out the first tournament, they do now. The crowd are so into it, it’s pretty loud. They make long drawn out sounds of suspense anytime someone just misses, and cheer or clap with each win from me.

I don’t have time to notice how Jennifer is tallying the score, although I know all the marks would be by my name.

Now Dutch and Jimmy stand up at the same time, and head toward me from opposite corners.

I can sense what Jimmy is doing out of the corner of my eye, so I watch Dutch first. His side kick comes the closest to my chest anyone’s has, and after I’ve avoided him, I time my reverse crescent to take care of Jimmy, and move in on Dutch before he has time to realise what I’m doing.

I force Bobby to retreat from my spinning kicks to put him out of reach, while I wait for Tommy’s kicks coming at me, and I’m bouncing on the soles of my feet as I dodge and then whirl around in a circle away from him and let the momentum carry me back in, to take both legs away so he’s flat on his back, and extracting myself before Bobby expects me to, flipping up to block his jab and driving into his ribs.

One by one the pairs tag each other in, and I put them down on the floor, but it’s only a few bouts until they start to synchronise better.

Then it gets much harder.

Bobby kicks up at my head and I duck and strike him in the side, but Tommy’s driving punch knocks the wind from me, and it’s the first hit I’ve taken.

“Woo, yeah!” he crows, looking crazy, and a din of cheers and boos go up.

Dutch and Jimmy taste blood, and nearly get me, and then Bobby takes me down to the floor, grinning right in my face as he gets his cheers. “How’s that feel?” he asks, and I narrow my eyes.

I can admit I’m not worth two of any of them if they actually work together very well, especially if one of them is Bobby, so it all comes down to how they pair their attacks. When they don’t, it goes my way most of the time, although I’m hot, breathing hard, working with all my effort for it.

“Try harder,” I tell Dutch next time, and then when Bobby’s jumping side kick floats into the space I just occupied, I taunt him, “Too slow.”

He gets me again, though, while I’m deflecting Tommy’s hooks, and right after the blow connects, hard, I hear Bobby’s voice. “What was that you just said?”

Only one time I glance at Ali, and there’s something in her eyes that nearly unmans me, confuses me, and makes me lose focus for a moment, which Dutch capitalises on, and I grunt my annoyance at him. So I can’t look that way again.

I get Bobby the next two times, one strike connecting to his chest, which is as wet with sweat as mine is. Focussing for revenge on him means the closest possible shave with Tommy, but I pull it off.

They swap pairs, and start giving me even less time to recover before they tag in, so that I have to anticipate movement from two new directions only split seconds after the previous two. I can’t fully catch my breath, but I have just enough to keep succeeding a little over half the time, in seeing, anticipating, blocking and attacking.

I’ve got my legs around Tommy, having brought him to the ground, when Dutch’s open hand comes down and I’m forced to roll away, but he’s overextended, and I jab up as I get to my feet, grazing the edge of his gi, and I don’t have time to deflect the punch that connects to my chest.

He pretty much runs around the square with his hands in the air, getting his cheers, and retreats to his spot.

By this time, I’ve taken hits from all of them, and landed many myself, and the crowd is going completely nuts. It sounds like everyone’s forgotten their particular bias, and instead are appreciating that we’re putting ourselves right on the line for this, every ounce of our energy in it.

I’m still breathing hard, hurting and drained, but summoning my will to keep blocking and retaliating.

Jennifer tells everyone I’m ahead on points, but that we’ll have one final round, where anything goes until either I get hit, or I get all of them, all of us in the square. The four of them circle while she speaks, but I kneel and close my eyes.

This gives me the pause I need to gather myself again for one push, concentrating, which is what they should be doing, but they’re overconfident in the moment, like they’ve forgotten this part of training, caught up in the wild atmosphere of tonight, and so sure they’re going to take me down and make the crowd even wilder, that they aren’t bothering.

Everything of me centers in my thought and my focus. I’ve already won on points, due to the early rounds of one-on-one which went to me, but I want to finish this my way. I know the key will be to get rid of one or two of my friends before they can work out how to give each other space and get in time together, because that’s a lot harder than you’d think unless you practice it. It should push this in my favor.

I search for the inner focus and summon my concentration onto picturing their favorite moves, likely possibilities, and how to defy them. I find my will, and shape it into what I’ll need.

We start: I jump up and weave between Bobby and Tommy’s twin onslaught to backhand Dutch before he can think, and reach far with everything I have to drive into Jimmy’s sternum. I nearly get my head taken off by Tommy’s foot, but I duck and spear him, and just like that, three are gone. The cheers are ringing loud in my ears, and it’s a joy to circle Bobby last, smirking at him, because he knows. He knows. His fist is easy to block, his kicks way more of a challenge to dodge, but it’s not that long before I grapple and take him down with satisfaction, and a roar goes up.

*

It seems everyone wants to congratulate us, and the girls too, and we’re the centre of attention for a while.

Samantha comes up to me, flashing me a brilliant smile which pulls me in automatically, and her blue eyes are full of invitation.

She says in her soft voice, “You need to cool off after that workout, Johnny? We could go down to the water.”

I draw a shallow breath, about all I can, when she steps into the side of me, and when I don’t object, one hand moves across my stomach, and slips inside my gi.

I swallow, looking down at her, at the perfect blonde hair framing her face, at her features which have no faults, and I’m warring with a reaction I don’t want to have, when Jimmy comes by right then.

“Hey! Johnny, I need a hand. Do you mind?”

I go light with relief, for the excuse, for a way out without losing face in front of everyone.

“Maybe some other time?” Samantha murmurs to me.

“Yeah, maybe,” I say, unsure whether I mean it, and mostly sure I don’t, but there’s literally no guy that wouldn’t be tempted, especially when I haven’t forgotten what it’s like with her. She’s a nice girl too, really good company in other ways than just that, and never expects sex to mean anything permanent.

I follow Jimmy out onto the patio, and wait for him to tell me what we’re doing.

When he doesn’t, I look confused. “What just happened?”

“I saved you, from complete and utter destruction.”

I laugh lightly. “Hardly. Although, you’re right, I didn’t wanna go down that road with her, not really, so thanks.” My body cools fairly quickly, and I know why I reacted, which is pretty simply determined by the fact that’s it’s been a little while.

Jimmy gives me a look like I’m a moron. “You have no idea, do you?”

“No idea about what?”

“You can’t… you can’t possibly be that stupid, can you, Johnny?”

“Hey,” I warn. “What the fuck?”

Jimmy practically laughs in my face. “Oh my god. You _are,_ aren’t you? You mean, you seriously don’t know?”

“You better tell me what you’re talking about, and preferably in the next five seconds.”

He crosses his arms defiantly. “Nope, someone so stupid doesn’t deserve any help from me. If you didn’t notice Ali’s face just then, that's not my problem.”

I’m standing there frowning, trying work out what he means, when he starts to walk away.

“Hey!”

But he keeps walking, heading back inside, where everyone else still is.

“What face? _Hey!_ ”

He waves a hand at me and throws me a look of contempt.

I turn to look in there, and Ali isn’t even there, that I can see. Obviously there was something, for Jimmy to bring this up, but I am missing the details that I need to make sense of it.

I can only guess she was annoyed about what happened just then, because I can’t think of anything else from tonight that would be it. I don’t get it. Why would she care if I fell into some chick’s arms, or not? It’s happening plenty around here, so it’s not exactly a big deal.

But actually, I’ve just remembered Ali seems not to like Samantha so much, so I guess maybe that’s it. That’s probably pretty fair, I think with a smile. If some guy I really hated tried to get it on with her, it would bother me way more than someone I didn’t know, or something. I remember that feeling very well.

I guess I should thank Jimmy for the rescue, because Ali gets mad at me enough about little things, without me screwing it up by doing that. It makes my decision about that chick easy, because as sweet as she is, Samantha doesn’t really have any place in my priority list, and Ali’s right at the top.

I’ve given up trying to do anything about that. Some things just are the way they are, and there’s nothing you can do to change it.

*

Ali’s very chilly to me, when I find her on the beach later, after we’ve all gotten changed.

I sit down next to her, where she is with a group, and she turns herself away from me to talk to Barbara, cutting me out.

I’ve got Aaron on my other side, and he keeps me busy with talking about the matches, and every now and again I try to talk to Ali, but she gives very short answers.

“Hey, you alright?” I ask.

“I’m fine. I’m trying to talk here, but you keep interrupting me.”

I try to get her to look at me, which she’ll only do briefly, and I let her go, after that. Barbara sends me a disappointed look which I don’t need, because she’s not someone I was trying not to let down, so she can mind her own business.

Greg and Freddy come down with some girls later, and they sit in the middle of our circle, talking to various people, and I clench up when Samantha drops down on her knees in front of me.

“Hey,” she says playfully.

I go for distracted, rather than rude, and know I can give her the message without making her look bad.

“Hey.”

“You wanna go for a walk?”

“Nah, I gotta talk to Aaron about something. Sorry.”

I see confusion in her eyes, but she covers it quickly enough and shrugs at me. “Suit yourself.” I see her turning around to talk to Greg, and she crawls across to get closer to where he’s sitting. By the look from him, she’s going to have a lot of luck there.

“You nuts?” Aaron mutters at me.

“Huh?”

“Girl like that asks you to go for a walk, and you say _no_?”

I shrug. “Not interested. Not my type.”

Aaron gives me a look of disbelief and whistles. “Must be nice to be able to take your pick like that.”

“From what I see, you do okay…” I briefly think about asking him whether he’s noticed that Susan is interested, but if I ever got found out, that would start world war three with Ali’s friends.

He gives a smug laugh. “Well sure, but any tips on how I can get Samantha to ask me, instead?”

Tina’s on the other side of him, and eventually we all get talking about bikes together, although Aaron’s out of his depth.

I tell her, “You know you’re the first girl, the first person, he ever let ride his bike, right?”

She gives this little smirk. “Oh yeah?”

“Absolutely.”

“Thanks for inviting me, that day.”

“No problem.” With the way she looks at me for a moment, I suspect she’s thanking me for more, even though I doubt she knows much about all of it. I certainly haven’t told Bobby, and I think Ali would be the same.

I flash Tina a smile, like it’s nothing. The whole thing’s been fun for me, to watch Dutch, and she’s real cool, so it’s no big thing to do something nice for her, and most of all, it’s kept Ali and I busy, planning, talking, at least until whatever’s gotten into her tonight.

It might be twenty minutes later when Dutch comes down the steps.

“There you all are,” he tells me, and includes Tina in the greeting.

In a near repeat of Samantha’s approach, he squats down in front of Tina. He’s got his bike clothes back on, his jacket, and he puts his arms around his knees while he balances at her level.

“You wanna go for another ride?”

“Sure,” she says, shrugging. “With everyone, again?”

“Nah,” Dutch says, and I can see how aware he is of me listening in. “I was thinking just you and me.”

Tina’s doing a fair job of reacting not too much, I guess. “Oh yeah?”

Dutch looks down for a second, and then back up at her. “Yeah, I mean, if you want to.”

She says, her voice low, “We gonna go on your bike?”

“That’s what I was thinking.”

She finally gives him her full smile, and relief breaks into his face, that he hasn’t misread her. I’ve literally never seen him question himself with a girl, and I’m going to give him plenty of shit for that later on. I won’t forget this, and I won’t let him live it down, but of course, that will wait until the next time I see him alone. I’m not gonna ruin this for him.

He stands up and offers her a hand, which she takes to get up, although they let go right away.

They say goodbye to us, and head to the steps, and she’s zipping up her jacket. I see him scratch the back of his head, pretty lost about what to do next, but I’m guessing he’ll figure it out.

*

**[X]**

*

It starts to get late, since the matches went for so long, and we didn’t start ‘til night time, and a lot of people are going home.

Once Aaron’s gone, Barbara gets up too, and I can’t quite tell what that look is from her, but she goes inside and leaves me next to Ali, so that we’re by ourselves.

“Can you please tell me what I did wrong?” I say softly.

“Nothing,” she says, and breathes out. “Sorry. I was in a mood, and I didn’t mean to be rude.”

“You sure? You can tell me what I did, and I can fix it.”

“It’s fine, you didn’t do anything. Relax, okay?”

She smiles at me shyly, and lies down on her back, and I can tell I’m supposed to follow her.

We start talking, like that little bit of time never happened, and soon I’ve pretty much forgotten it.

“You’ve still got it, too,” she tells me. “Way more than I do, with cheering. You seriously haven’t been doing karate for two years?”

“Well, not really. Like I said, I tried a few places, but couldn’t really find anything I liked.”

“You should try again,” she advises me. “I want to see you back competing.”

“Oh yeah?” I say teasingly, because I’ve worked out exactly how much I can get away with. “And why’s that?”

She elbows me and turns her head to me. “Cut it out. Because you’re incredible, that’s why.”

“Um,” I begin, overwhelmed by the compliment, but then I gather myself, “Well, I guess I’ve been waiting for you to tell me that for many years. So… thank you.”

She laughs and rolls over to face me, shuffling back so this doesn’t bring her right up against me.

“Will you shut up?”

“I’m not sure I can. Oh, and can I get it in writing? I’m thinking of getting it framed.”

She rolls her eyes, and I can see in there that we really are friends, that she cares for me, because she’s giving me warmth.

“Are you hearing what I’m trying to tell you, for real, or should I just give up?”

“Yeah,” I say quietly. “Thanks, Ali.”

I turn over and prop my head up on one hand, my elbow a triangle beneath me, and wait to see if I’m too close, but apparently I’m not.

There are one or two other little groups doing the same as us, just sitting and talking, and it’s pretty chilled out down here now. If being Ali’s friend means I get to lie on the beach with her, effectively by ourselves, and talk to her for as long as we want, I guess there might not be many better things I could hope for.

“Good,” she says. “No one with a gift like that should let it go to waste.”

“Okay.”

“You promise me?”

I smile at her. “If you’d like me to.”

I’m trying to think back to how many drinks I had after the match, and whether they might explain the shaky beat of my heart, the last minute or two.

Ali’s playing with the sand in between us, and I don’t know if she knows I’m staring at her, but I don’t mean to. I try to force myself not to, and it kinda works.

It’s the first time I’ve had her sort of by herself since the phone call, but I’m not sure if I should bring it up or not.

Maybe not. I’ll think up something else.

I ask, “So, you’re gonna be at college for a long time?”

“Years,” she says with a groan, but a happy one, I can tell. “And that’s just the beginning. After that comes intern.”

I give her a look of admiration. “You’re really gonna be a doctor, huh?”

“That’s the plan.”

“That’s amazing. You’re gonna do great, I know you will.”

“Thanks, Johnny.”

We talk for a little while longer, but eventually it’s a bit cold so we head up and call it a night.

When we’re walking up the steps, I say, “So, do I get some kind of prize or something? I got your friend what she wanted, first. We don’t even know if you’re gonna hold up your side, yet.”

She grins at me. “You’re sure it’s sealed?”

“Beyond sure. Trust me.”

When we get inside, she has to admit I’m right, because they are back, Dutch and Tina, and he’s got his arm around her neck, in the middle of the group they’re in, and she’s got her hand resting on his stomach.

“I’m waiting,” I say to Ali, as I see her watching them in disbelief.

“Holy shit.”

“Told you.” I won’t add that, from their body language, from their ease with the way they are touching each other, they clearly didn’t spend much time riding, when they went out together. Ali can figure that out, or not, or hear about it from Tina, I’m sure.

She gives me a nod. “Okay, I admit it. You’re a genius.”

“And you owe me?” I suggest.

She smiles wryly. “And I’m pretty sure it won’t be long until I deliver my side.”

“It better not be.”

I notice she’s ignored what I said about getting a prize, which is not surprising, since she lost.

“I’ll see you on Wednesday. I’m gonna come around five, but I gotta go at eight thirty.”

“Okay, cool. Night?”

“Night, Johnny.”

I wait until she’s over saying goodbye to Jennifer and Jimmy, and catch Barbara, who is still here.

“Hey, I wonder, is there any way I can get you to do me a favor?”

She raises an eyebrow. “That depends on what kind.”

“I’ve got something in my car that I want to give to Ali. I’m wondering… would you be willing to take it round there for me?”

“Yeah, I guess. You don’t wanna just give it to her yourself?”

“Nah, it’s a Christmas present. So you’ll do it?”

“Sure.”

I’m picturing Ali’s face when she digs it out on Christmas morning, totally amazed at how I managed to get it there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‘Riding’ is the name of the stand-alone short fic, and I guess you know what it’s about if you’ve read down to the **[X]** symbol in this chapter. PLEASE scroll back up right now if you haven’t, because you’ll get spoiled if you keep reading this.
> 
> Find ‘Riding’ on my profile, or by clicking the Dutch tag. For more Tina POV, you should read KingKarate’s ‘Rising Tide’ at some point, if you haven’t already. You should definitely consider reading this before you click on 'Riding', because then you can see Tina's path to there in her own eyes, and not just through Johnny's. It's pretty epic XD
> 
> Malibu readers: please note there’s a VERY different tone to ‘Riding’, as this is Tina’s POV, and a sexy, graphic oneshot with Dutch, rather than a long, emotional fix-it drama :’)
> 
> Hope you enjoyed this chapter, and ‘Riding’ if you headed over there too. I’d love to hear about it from you :D 💓
> 
> re: **Samantha**  
>  I’m gonna throw a random note here about Samantha. She’s a very, very small character in this story, so I guess I don’t get to show her to you as much as I’d like to/could’ve. But I love her. She’s a sweet girl who likes sex with guys she knows and likes, and doesn’t need there to be strings attached. I wrote her as a sex-positive character, to help assuage the fact that there are some other troubling (mild-ish) social justice themes in this story that Johnny doesn’t have the awareness to call out, and also it was the 80s, and that shit’s fucked, yo, so I don’t get to address them at all. I _did_ choose out to leave a whole bunch of the possible toxic 80s shit, cos I don’t want that here, AND IT’S MY STORY, so I can choose to do that, but _some_ of it is here for realism. Samantha was one tiny push back against that culture, my way of saying if a girl wants to get laid, she should be able to be allowed want to, and be allowed to do it. I don’t care if people didn’t have that attitude about it in the 80s – I’m putting that in there cos I WANT it in there. And Ali’s group have a similar mind about sex being healthy if people want to do it. THAT is not what makes Ali dislike Sam – it’s the fact that Ali is a human, and still very young. Not everything she thinks or does is like 100% amazingly perfectttt. I don’t mind that. I still love her, too. She’s insecure about the girl queen from another (older) year group (not that all or even many girls have to be insecure about that – I just decided my Ali WAS, and won’t ever tell anyone she is, and maybe doesn’t even KNOW she is insecure about it), and she also has some puzzled feelings about her ex, and Sam is on the circle of that issue, and therefore, Ali doesn’t like Samantha. That’s all it is, nothing very worrying, just human nature. I mean, you may have noticed Johnny being insecure about Aaron in the early chapters too. I didn’t give Samantha’s character/mindset a lot of room in the story, because it’s a background issue, and I didn’t want my story to FORCE the issue either. I thought it might be more powerful if I normalised it by NOT drawing heaps of attention to it. But yes, maybe I need to. Please understand I fully approve of Samantha, and also, the way she backs off if people aren’t interested is healthy, too. She doesn’t start shit. She likes sex, just like some of the guys do, and I have no problem with it :) Can’t blame her really XD
> 
> And as a tiny issue, it does get a tiny bit of closure, which you can look out for in later chapters <3


	11. Wednesday 4: Christmas Eve

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Thank you for the recent comments here on earlier chapters from new readers, and on what happened last time here and/or at the other story that went with Chapter 10; so summing all that up, thank you to: sam, InvisibleObserver13, KingKarate, MandyJ, LMT, Jules1980 and Tori Tarantino! It’s such an amazing feeling logging in and seeing what you’ve written, and the super-specific comments are THE BOMB. Thanks also to the new Kudos givers. Super appreciated! I’m not sure if there are many new readers, or more return hits, but if you are new, hi! Nice to have you here :)
> 
> I’m sure you realise/hope we’re getting closer to Johnny and Ali getting back together. That’s why I threw those tags up about the sex, in advance, because you’re on Johnny’s journey, where you’re gonna have to wait and see when it happens. It sure isn’t in this chapter.
> 
> Anddddddd, ‘smut’ isn’t the right word for the major love scene, and I’d be tempted to rate it down to M, except that it goes for nearly 4000 words so I’m guessing that’s pretty E *__* so I’ll leave it. We’ll get there, sometime.
> 
> Also really want to warn you, the Angst tags are still required for now. Also those tension tags, THEY ARE A THING FOR A REASON <3 As is the one that says ‘eventually resolved’. 
> 
> Don't forget about the related work "Rising Tide" by KingKarate, which tells Tina's story during Malibu. It is being written live, by a total icon, and I highly recommend you give it a look XD There will always be warnings on the chapters over there so you know which ones they match/spoil here, and you can keep up with the main storyline and then head there for a different and extended take. I am loving reading it, and finding out what else was happening during the parties :')
> 
> Okay, that’s all my reminders XD

When Bobby and I pull up, there are two figures on a bike, helmets tucked under their arms as they make out, the girl sitting facing back toward the guy, kind of in his lap.

They don’t even notice us, or the way Bobby is grinning at me when we start up towards Jimmy’s.

“This is an interesting turn,” he comments.

“It is, isn’t it? Personally, I’m hoping she has a maturing effect on him. Maybe turns him straight.”

Bobby barks a laugh. “That girl? No chance. If anything, we’re gonna have more trouble now there’s two of them.”

I smile. “She’s basically his clone, right?”

“It’s uncanny,” Bobby agrees, and we’re opening the back door.

*

Rightly or wrongly, all of us have decided to take part in the drinking game, this time. Tonight is a simple one: someone asks the group a question, and you can either give an answer, or pass and take a drink.

We’re all on the sofas, around the coffee table full of drinks, beers and spirits. There’s probably only twenty or so of us, tonight, but my friends are here, and Ali, so that’s what I care most about.

I’m kinda surprised she’s sitting here in the game, since she doesn’t get drunk very often at all, but I guess it’s either that or be the only one not playing.

I chose to drink when the question was most embarrassing moment with a girl or guy, as did pretty much everyone except a few show-offs, like Freddy and Josh, who sounded like they were lying to get laughs, which they did.

Dutch and Tina also had some fun with that one, although soon after that, I noticed they aren’t with us anymore, which isn’t that surprising, when I think about it, which I try not to.

I can answer most of the other questions, and we all learn a few funny things from each other. We’re having a great time.

When Erin asks, “What’s the stupidest thing you ever did after a break up?” I think about reaching for the bottle on the table right away, since I have no interest in making either me or Ali feel awkward.

But I hear her say, “Went on the rebound,” and I feel my eyes dragged unwillingly to where she’s sitting.

She doesn’t hold my gaze for long, but I know what that was referring to, and I figure that could mean that maybe I’m allowed to answer, too.

Tommy’s answer is about forgetting the girl’s name, which makes Erin roll her eyes at him, and Barbara’s talking about a makeover which went wrong, giving heaps of details, which has everyone laughing, until tears nearly come, although not me, because I’m quietly watching Ali, since her face changes so much when she laughs that hard, and it’s nice to see her so happy.

When that has died down, I clear my throat, and she looks across at me. I try not to put much weight into it when I say, “Kissing Ali without her permission at the Country Club, like a jerk.”

Josh is making a sound about that, because word sure got around about the way she hit me, and I can’t help but give an awkward smile, as people smirk at me.

“What can I say? I learned my lesson. The medical bill was huge.”

Ali’s biting her cheek and shakes her head at me, not wanting to find it funny, and I try not to smile at her for too long.

Some of the questions are about things nothing to do with romance, but it always seems to come back there, and once people have had a few drinks, they lose their control a bit on what they’re willing to say, so it gets more interesting as time goes on.

“Biggest regret of someone you never got together with?” Steve asks us all, and I have to take a drink, since I had the girl, even if I no longer do.

Barbara has been speaking pretty loosely, the last little while, and many of her stories make an impression.

But this one has the rest beat, when she says, “Being so stuck on the idea that girls can’t ask guys out, that I didn’t ask Bobby to the dance, at the end of sophomore year, until it was too late.”

This gets some cheers and a few heckles about the one that got away, but Barbara’s holding her nerve, and looking at my stunned friend, and I’m just watching her in disbelief. Eventually I think to look at Ali, who gives me a knowing, winning smile, like she told me so, which I guess she did.

Bobby had better think of a reply, because I don’t think Barbara was hoping he’d gape at her like that.

“You wanted to ask me?”

“Yeah,” she admits, with an awkward smile.

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because I found out you’d already asked Tanya.”

“Oh,” Bobby says, thinking back. “Right.”

“Yeah.”

We’re all listening, and I’m considering the need to punch him, to get his brain going, but he comes out with, “How about if I asked you out on a date, now? Would you say yes?”

“I might,” she says, with a sly smile. “Are you asking me?”

“Yeah. I am.”

“Then I say yes.”

Bobby breaks into this stupid grin. “Yeah?”

She rolls her eyes, and they get some approving clapping and cheers. Bobby’s looking around sheepishly, still idiotically happy with his good luck, and I flick my eyebrows at him.

Even though I think they might want to sit together, neither of them get up, and I notice Ali taking a drink right at the end of the round, like she was hoping no one would notice, and to be fair probably only I did, with the new distraction.

The game resumes for a while after that. When we stop, I realise it isn’t that long until she’ll be leaving, so it feels nice when she follows me, after a minute or so, out of the doors, to sit on the outside patio together, where nobody else is.

We both pull up an extra chair, and sit with our legs up, facing across from each other and our legs in the middle.

“You gonna be okay to drive?” I ask.

“Yeah, I only had about three or four, and it’s been a while. It’ll be fine.”

“Cool. I don’t mind giving you a lift, if you need.”

“Nah, that’s okay. You stay, and I’m fine anyway.”

“What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Lunch. Well, lunch that turns into eating all day.” Ali smiles fondly. “We’ve got family in from all over. How about you?”

“Oh, you know,” I say quietly, and her face falls.

“Sorry, of course. Hey, I don’t suppose you wanna come to ours instead?” she says lightly, not meaning it.

I manage a smile. “It’s fine. We got a few people coming too, and it won’t be all bad. With any luck he’ll start drinking in the morning, and maybe need a nap, if I keep him supplied. That’s what usually happens.”

“Good. I hope your afternoon is good, at least.”

“It’ll be fine. You know what you’re getting for Christmas?”

“Oh, a few things. You?”

“Not really. Mom still likes to surprise me. She makes a lot of effort on Christmas actually, tries to make it a real good day for me.”

“That’s sweet.”

“Yeah. I got her some earrings, and this matching necklace, which I think she’s gonna love, so hopefully she has a good day, too.”

“That’s great.”

“That game wasn’t so bad, huh?”

“No, it was okay. And we can’t really argue with the results, can we?”

We look through the glass, and see Barbara and Bobby on the sofa together, nobody very near them. She’s turned side on to face him, with her knee resting up on the seat, talking, and he’s leaning back on his cushion, listening, looking at her in a way that hardly hides anything. Bobby was never very good at that.

“Well done,” I offer. “Even if it did take you a while.”

“Thanks. You gotta admit I had the harder job.”

“Not unless you admit I did most of the work for both of us.”

She laughs. “I’m gonna miss the challenge. Are you?”

“Yeah.”

“Any ideas what we can do next?”

“That’s enough matchmaking for me,” I say.

“Yeah. Maybe we’ll think of something else.”

I can think of some things, none of which will be possible.

I’ve realised, of course, that everything Tommy said would happen, is happening. I can’t pretend I’m not falling in love with her again.

The thing is, maybe it won’t break my heart, after all.

With how close she’s letting me in, and I think if I keep doing well, we’ll keep getting closer, the only thing missing is that I can’t hold her, can’t touch her, things which I try very hard not to thinking about wanting to do.

I’m not saying this is my dream situation, but compared to where we were the past few years, it’s better than _any_ dream. And weirdly, Ali and I have never actually been as close as this before, not emotionally, which as I’m getting older, I think I’m realising is something I need from a girl. I’ve been around with some really hot girls, but if there isn’t more to it than that, no matter how hot they are, I don’t stay interested for long anymore; I’ve changed. I’m bored. It’s too easy, and it means nothing, the second it’s done. I’m not saying I don’t still like hot girls, but I want the intensity, as well, of being with someone I care about, because it makes the whole thing _way_ better.

And I basically have that with Ali here in our friendship, just minus the physical stuff. It feels amazing to be this close to her, to let her see parts of me, to trust her with who I am, and have her be okay with what she sees. With me.

Even with Bobby there’s a bunch of things we won’t discuss, as guys, but with Ali, I talk about pretty much anything, and hide nothing from her. Well, except this one thing.

So maybe, maybe, this won’t break my heart. She’s not in my arms, but she’s in my life, and better than that, she wants me in hers in a big enough way that I can feel it.

I think I can follow the rules she’s set out, although there’s a shadow I’m refusing to acknowledge in the corner of my mind about how we will keep this up when college starts.

I still have more than a week, closer to two, and I won’t ruin it by worrying about that.

“Are you okay with what I said in that round?” I say, after some silence.

“Yeah, sure. Not like that was a secret, anyway.”

I smile at her. “Did you take boxing lessons I didn’t know about?” I rub my jaw in memory.

Ali bites her cheek. “Might have helped if I did, maybe I wouldn’t have sprained my wrist.”

This surprises a laugh from me, which makes her glare at me. “Sorry, but are you for real?”

“Yes,” she says irritably. “And it isn’t funny.”

“I’m sorry,” I repeat, and force my smile away. “I didn’t know that.”

She huffs. “Well, I didn’t want you to. I didn’t want anyone to; it’s embarrassing.”

“As embarrassing as being punched by a girl who’s never fought, and having it leave a noticeable bruise?”

She’s crossing her arms, and narrowing her eyes, and I can’t get enough of the way she’s looking at me. “Well, you sure deserved it.”

“I know. You can hit me again, if you like. I can even show you how to do it so it won’t hurt you, this time.”

“Shut up.”

“Hey, the offer’s there.”

*

Christmas goes fairly much to my plan, which means the morning sucks, apart from presents, and the afternoon is actually pretty great. I spend hours with Mom and the family, outside in our big undercover area, since the weather is cool but fairly mild. She’s real happy, so much that it makes my heart a bit sore, because I wish she felt that way, way more often.

She keeps touching her earrings, and telling me how much she likes them, and asking me how I feel about the clothes, the new Walkman, all the things she got me.

I tell her, heaps of times, how great a job she’s done with Christmas this year.

The day ends with a phone call on my line, which begins with Ali’s voice saying, “How the hell did you manage to sneak that into my house?”

I smile contentedly, and settle back against my pillows.

“I think I should be allowed one secret from you, c’mon. Let’s just say I had help.”

“So you didn’t break in, in the middle of the night, or anything?”

“No, I leave that kind of shit to Santa to do. So…” I wind the spiral phone cord around my finger. “Do you like it?”

“It’s great. We didn’t say we were doing presents, though.” She sounds annoyed.

“I didn’t know I had to say. And let’s face it, I’ve owed you a radio for what, nearly two and a half years? It barely counts as a present, if you think of it like that.”

“Hmm,” she says. “I guess you’re right. It’s probably good I didn’t get you anything, then.”

“Right.” I smile.

We talk into the night.


	12. Saturday 4, Part 1: Bobby and Barbara

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading :) It’s been great for me to keep seeing what you think about last chapter and some of the earlier ones. I’m very grateful for your letting me know the story is still doing it for you.
> 
> So we’ve resolved the two major subplots of romances, although obviously those plots will continue along in their new forms. One of them will have many more fleshed out details that come from the amazing KingKarate in ‘Rising Tide’, which I hope you’re reading along with <3 The romance arc is intensifying right now in that story, and it gives you a great glimpse into the build-up before Chapter 9 and 10 of Malibu, which is where the next update of Rising Tide will bring you up to. And that of course heads seamlessly into my story ‘Riding’, which you can head to from here (Chap 10) and from there (when Chap 5 updates, over the next little while), or BOTH <3.
> 
> Another good thing is, now Johnny can interact more with Barbara, right? Maybe even eventually with Susan? :) The many other sub plotlines will continue too, until they all reach the closure I felt apt for them. But I guess you understand (and hope?) that now we get to focus on our main plot, front and centre, for the rest of the ride from here on out. This is what we’ve been waiting for. Lots of groundwork has been laid for their relationship. They have a friendship now, a connection that Johnny is loving, even given his realisation last chapter.
> 
> If only we could see inside Ali’s head, hey?
> 
> I guess it’s worth nothing that while Dutch is very into motor and engine AND bike culture, that doesn’t necessarily apply to all the Cobras in Malibu, not at this time period, and maybe there was always a spectrum of that, I’m not sure. Anyway, I don’t see it as a defining characteristic for Johnny right now, for example. You either need to me make this note, or you don’t, and if not, please ignore.
> 
> The approach I take for the next handful of chapters felt like it fit perfectly for Johnny and Ali, the characters, their past, and their development in this story. If you wrote this story, you might make different choices. I made these ones. I think they lead to my end, like a highway lit up with a fuckload of route markers, flashing lights and mile signs, but I guess that’s because I can see the end. Hopefully this moves you there, too :)
> 
> Updates every couple of days or so, until we're all done.

At the last party before New Year's, it’s pretty clear that Ali and I have managed to set up two relationships for our friends, which have at least the starting potential to be more than a hook-up.

Bobby hangs out with a few different groups, but he brings Barbara along to most of them, or follows her when she goes to her friends, and I wonder how things are going for them over there with Susan. I also wonder just how sickening it’s going to be to watch, for all of us, over the next little while, because those two are holding hands like they can’t bear to be apart, even for a few seconds. It’s probably gonna get completely gross.

Dutch and Tina arrive together, and while they don’t spend every second at each other’s side, they sure don’t make any bones about making out in one corner of the big room, for what seems like fifteen minutes straight, and it’s not what you’d call the version rated for general audiences.

Tommy seems to have come to terms with them okay, accepted that it’s happening, that Tina’s with him. I see him and Dutch throwing each other looks, which have a very obvious point, at various times during the party, and I think for their own sakes they better not let their girls see those.

Tommy and I hang out together for a while at the bar, once it gets dark, and he asks me, “So, what’s it like being the only single one, at the moment?”

I stare at him, my spirits sinking, as that truth settles on me.

“Shit. How the fuck did I let that happen?”

“Don’t worry, Johnny,” he taunts me, patting me on the back. “Maybe we’ll let you tag along when we all go on group dates. And who knows, maybe you’ll find someone special, just for you, although I don’t hold much hope.”

“Shut your mouth.”

“You gonna make me?”

I shrug. “I guess we’ll see if you force me to.”

He sees me looking across the room, where Ali is, and I sense him shaking his head.

“Are you willing to admit I’m right, yet?”

“No,” I tell him definitely, even though he sure is.

“Whatever, man. Seriously, though. People are starting to talk about you guys. I almost want something to happen, because it’s killing me to watch.”

“Nothing’s gonna happen,” I have to remind him, and I decide not to fully hide that I have some feelings about that, in the way that I say it. I’m willing to let Tommy hear just a little bit, that I admit I could see, would _wanna_ see, Ali as other than a friend, if I had the chance. Even though there won’t be one.

But it’s all he’s fucking getting.

“How can you be so sure? I mean, I still say it’s the worst idea, possibly _ever_ , because I haven’t forgotten how that all went with you two, even though it seems to be slipping a lot of memories around here. But how do you know she’s not thinking about it, just like you are? And please, don’t bother denying that you are.”

“She’s told me, like I said. About a hundred times.” Okay, so I’m exaggerating, and maybe it’s been a while since she said it.

“Oh, and she can’t possibly be lying, right?”

I frown at Tommy. “I don’t think Ali lies to me, not about much, and she wouldn’t lie about that.”

He sighs at me. ‘C’mon, you know as well as I do, if she was gonna lie about anything, that’s exactly what it _would_ be. You know what girls are like.”

“Tommy, can you let it go? I’m working pretty hard on… not having any hope about it. Just being great with how things are, because things _are_ great. It’s fine. It’s enough. It’s gonna be enough for me, just to have her as someone, like a friend. Don’t make it hard for me.”

“Alright.” He softens. “Sure, I get it. Hey, I’m gonna go have a word with Bobby. I’m still trying to get all this straight about how he got into Barbara’s pants, and he’s holding out.”

“I don’t know if I’m sure he’s been in her pants, and good luck. I doubt he’ll tell you anything.” He sure was tight-lipped with me, which I took as a good sign for their future.

Tommy just laughs, pretty evilly. “We’ll see.”

*

Jimmy’s got a fire going on the beach tonight, and by ten o’clock, people abandon their drinking games, make-out sessions and other various activities and pretty much all congregate around, down there. There’s a bunch of rugs, and towels too, in case of skinny dipping, which seems unlikely given how occupied Dutch is, but I guess you never know.

Jimmy’s got some music going, and he’s keeping us supplied with a stock of drinks. I think Susan’s just realised that now three of her friends are going out with three of mine, and she doesn’t look thrilled, to say the least. She’s not too bad to Bobby or me, not that we talk much, but when we have to, it could go worse than it does. Although she basically pretends Dutch doesn’t exist, that there isn’t anyone sitting behind Tina with an arm slung around her neck, because Dutch is just tied too closely with Tommy for her, I guess.

We chat in a big group for ages, and then people break away into clusters here or there, sometimes moving between groups after a while.

Bobby and I decide to go for a walk, and Barbara jumps up to go with us, and then invites Ali so I won’t be a third wheel, I guess. Bobby grabs a few of the blankets, in case we get cold, and he throws me one to carry. I think about what Tommy said before, about people talking, and maybe there is something to it, because Nicole, Josh, Freddy, Aaron, and a few others do watch us as we walk past, on our way off up the beach together, like, in that way people do when they’ve broken off what they’re saying because they noticed you, and won’t start again until you’re out of earshot, so that you don’t hear. I might be imagining it being about me and Ali, though, because it’s probably equally likely to be about Bobby and Barbara, seeing as they’re the new cross-group item.

I’m still irritated I didn’t realise that I was going to end up the only one of us with no girl, out of all this. Considering everything I’ve done, it’s pretty unfair.

Not that I put a lot of stock in Tommy and Erin lasting much longer, because I think they’ve already peaked, and with Dutch, who the fuck even knows.

There’s a breeze again tonight, salty, cool but not cold, but it’s strong, so we might end up needing those blankets.

If I’m honest, I’m feeling tense for another reason.

I’ve already talked to Ali a bit, when we were all in groups, and I’m feeling pretty distracted by what she’s wearing tonight. It’s this creamy white cashmere sweater over light blue jeans, and she’s gotten rid of her shoes, so her delicate feet are in play, but more importantly, the sweater has one of those loose necks. Sometimes it falls down onto one of her bare shoulders a bit, and I assume I am required to somehow _not look_ there, before she pulls it back up, and each time this happens, I go a little bit crazier trying not to think about her collarbone and her neck.

Add in that the wool looks so soft that my fingers pretty much ache to touch it to see just _how_ soft, and that somehow it falls real nice over her body, and I’m in a bad way tonight. Now that we are walking, and she’s next to me, in between me and Barbara, I can’t help but notice some unexpected movement in the area below her neck, right above her ribs, where I’m normally very disciplined about not looking at Ali, since girls _always_ notice if you look there. The last thing I need to be thinking about is what kind of things she’s wearing under there, but I’m resigned to knowing it’s going to trouble my dreams tonight.

I don’t know where I can possibly look without making it much worse for myself, so I pretty much just face up the beach and clench my fists in my pockets as we walk, wondering if she has even the slightest idea what she’s doing to me right now.

Everyone’s talking about Christmas presents, and I join in giving my report.

“Hey,” Ali tells the others. “You’ll never guess what Johnny gave me.”

“You got Ali a present?” my friend asks me, looking across the girls. He jogs a few steps ahead and turns around to walk backwards just in front of us as we go.

“Not really,” I reason. “You remember that radio I broke?”

Bobby grimaces a little. “Like I could forget.”

“Well, I figured it was about time I replace it.”

I look across and I can see Barbara thinking to herself, so that’s what it was, because at the time, I didn’t tell her. I couldn’t risk her spoiling my secret.

“Pretty smooth, right?” Ali teases, and I flash her a smile.

Barbara comments, “Johnny seems to be taking smooth to a new level, these days. Tina told me that you’re at least somewhat responsible for what’s going on back there.”

“Just so we’re clear,” I reply, “can I ask, is that an accusation, or like, a compliment?”

I hear her give a little laugh. “I don’t know why I’m saying this, but I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, even my large doubts. Tina’s so cut up about him, I guess I have no choice.”

I hum thoughtfully. “Believe me, I’m worried, too. They could bring out the worst or the best in each other, and we don’t really know which way it’s gonna go, yet.”

“So… you did do something?”

Boy, does this feel like a dangerous conversation, given that they were the other half of our deal.

“Oh, not really. I started to talk to her in front of him, re-introduced them, only cos she and I were talking about bikes. That’s almost it, really.” No need to claim the credit I’m due. Ali knows, and that’s all that matters to me.

“Given how Dutch feels about Johnny, that would have been enough,” Bobby says, and I narrow my eyes at him.

“I don’t remember anyone asking you.”

He grins and falls back next to Barbara. “Touchy.”

We joke as we walk a little further, and then the girls want us to stop when we find another break in the houses, where it’s a bit quieter and more open, so we spread out the blankets to sit on, eight or nine yards from the shore, well out of reach of the rising tide.

I carefully choose my angle since I don’t want to be forced to watch too closely what’s happening on Bobby’s rug, since he lies down on his back, with his head on Barbara’s knee. She starts stroking his hair while she talks to Ali, who’s sitting on my blanket, facing half to me and half to them.

Barbara speaks to her. “I’ve missed this, I admit. Hanging out with these guys.”

“You missed me?” Bobby says up at his girl. “How much?”

“Watch it. Yes, I missed you, but I missed hanging out with all you guys.” She looks over at me. “I missed you, Johnny. We used to have fun, didn’t we?”

“We did, and me too. It’s pretty cool, isn’t it? What Jimmy’s done, here.”

“I have to agree,” Bobby says, with a moony look, and if he keeps pretending he doesn’t see me silently telling him to tone that shit down, I’m not gonna be able to sit here for much longer, with or without Ali in that sweater.

“How ‘bout you?” I ask Ali, daring a look at her, feeling some ease when I see there’s nothing too tempting visible, right at this second. “Have you missed me?”

She raises an eyebrow. “I thought you agreed not to hit on me.” There’s a sly little smile, and somehow I know Bobby’s eyes are on me.

“I’m not. How come Barbara’s allowed to say it? Was she hitting on me, just then?”

“You’d better hope she wasn’t,” comes Bobby’s voice.

“So,” Ali says, ignoring my question, and by now, there’s a slip from her sweater neck and it’s time for me to very much not look at her shoulder. I mean, it’s easier when we’re directly talking, I guess, since I’m focussed on her words, on her face, and not daydreaming or anything. “Is there a ride on Wednesday night?”

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”

“I see.” She looks patiently at me, but I’m not sure why.

“Are we going?” Barbara asks Bobby.

“Oh yeah, sure, if you wanna come. That’d be great.”

I get it now, I think, although I’m not totally sure, and I’m very confused about it if it’s true.

I say questioningly to Ali, “Do you… do you wanna come with us?”

I’m relieved to see I got it right.

“That sounds fun. You don’t mind taking me?”

_Mind?_

“Not at all. We’re gonna go from here, so I won’t pick you up or anything. I mean… not unless you want me to.”

“That’s okay. I’ll bring a jacket.”

Her mentioning clothes, of course, makes me fail the test and look down, just as she decides to finally hide herself away by pulling the sweater back up, and now I’m turning to look out at the waves instead, thinking tense thoughts.

I mean, why wear that top, when it doesn’t even stay on like clothing should, and for fuck’s sake, how much more can I be expected to bear of not looking, when it’s just so inviting? So nearly impossible not to, especially when she calls for my attention by talking to me in the first place. How much harder can she make it for me to keep my thoughts on her being my friend and no more, the way I’m trying so hard to?

I might lose my mind, all while Ali does this thoughtful deep sigh next to me, like she doesn’t have any burdens at all.

I can see, from the corner of my eye, that she’s turned to watch the ocean, too. “I can’t believe we’ve only got a week and a bit to go.”

“This has been the best winter,” Bobby agrees from behind us.

It hits me then, that Bobby gets to go back to college with her, with Barbara. Somehow, I am over the moon for him, that he gets to have his dream, and I simultaneously feel so empty, that Ali’s gonna take off, and I’m not sure how often I’ll be able to see her, when she does.

That feeling’s been growing a bit every day, I guess, gnawing me, and I’m afraid. It’s not like I’m gonna suddenly stop caring about her in a few days’ time, not after all that’s passed between us in the last month, and I’m worried about how much of our new friendship I’m going to lose, just due to life.

I wanna ask her if she’s gonna keep calling me, and if I’m allowed to call her. Maybe I will, later.

I hear a sound that means there was a kiss on the other blanket, and I turn back to them and make a point of clearing my throat.

Barbara is bent down over him, her hair hanging down long around her face, but she lifts up, grinning because Bobby has his finger up at me.

“What?” he says to me. “You gotta problem?”

“I’m looking at it.”

“Well, maybe we’ll go find some privacy someplace else,” he says snidely.

Barbara says, “I like the sound of that idea, Bobby…”

I’m not sure what Ali wants to do, so I wait while they get up, and Bobby picks up their blanket and starts to shake the sand off.

Barbara is giving Ali a look I don’t understand, maybe it’s to make sure she doesn’t mind Barbara taking off and leaving her with me, and Bobby takes the chance to raise his eyebrows at me, full of meaning that I one hundred percent get.

It’s comforting to know he’s noticed what I’m suffering through, and I don’t mean the sweater. We’re going to talk, on the way home, about this particular hell that Ali has created for me, and how I’m managing to cope with it.

The thing is, it’s hardly against my will. I can’t pretend at this stage that I’m not a willing participant.

Once they’re gone, I look a brief question at Ali, and she turns to face the sea properly, coming to sit closer next to me, bringing a trace of coconut in the air, like a cocktail drink, and I guess that must be her suntan oil, and there’s that flower scent again, too.

It’s real nice, not strong, just like walking past a garden.

She picks up the extra bit of blanket on her other side and lifts it to cover herself with. This means we’re staying.


	13. Saturday 4, Part 2: Ali and Johnny

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all :) It’s still great to have you along for the ride!! Thank you so much for the comments and any other interactions we’ve been having in various place on the internet, including about my story. It’s a blast to meet you and talk, seriously!
> 
> ‘Rising Tide’ by KingKarate is such a great read, telling Tina’s story more fully, so please enjoy it by looking up the author, clicking the Dutch tag, or going to related works.
> 
> Speaking of related works, I’m writing a new Jimmy Malibu spin-off called ‘A Match Made in Heaven’, which shows you behind the scenes of his relationship with Jennifer, and their plan for these parties, among other things :) Chapter 1 has been posted, and I hope you give it a go if it sounds like that might be up your alley. Can’t promise any particular posting schedule, or length, but there IS a thing. It is rated T. How about a round of applause for me, cos who knew I had that rating in me, right??
> 
> This scene picks up immediately at the end of Chapter 12.
> 
> The Johnny/Ali themes that come up in here are so complex... I've written a note about it on the next Chapter, see "Technical Note". In some ways, it would help to have it pasted here, but I can't since it's a spoiler if I do. I really think it might be worth reading it once you finish this chapter, just to explain anything that occurs in here.

“Okay,” I tell her. “I’m just gonna point out, that I noticed you avoided that question.”

She smiles a secretive smile. “You already know the answer. You know I missed you.”

“Well, it’s nice to hear you say it. I missed you, Ali.”

She nods and then swallows. “So, are you seeing anyone?”

“Funny,” I say drily. “If I asked you that, how likely is it you’d answer, you think? In fact, from memory, I already did, and you refused to tell me, even though I was just making conversation.”

She gives me just a little shove, and my lower arm, where I have pulled the sleeves of my jacket up a little, experiences that her sweater is a least as soft as I feared.

“I was just wondering,” she says, “since I haven’t really noticed you with your mind on girls while we’ve been here, well except once or twice. I assume that means you’re probably seeing someone, right?”

“No, I’m not seeing anyone.”

“Oh.”

I glance across. “You really think that wouldn’t have come up at some point, by now?”

“Yeah, I guess, I just wanted to make sure.”

Make sure for _what_? Why would she need to make sure?

“Is it important for you to know?”

There’s a small shrug, and no explanation.

Then Ali says, “I’m not, either. Seeing anyone. Only fair that I answer your question, from like, however many nights ago.”

“Okay,” I say carefully.

There’s something different in how she’s talking, in her tone, and I get the feeling the rules are changing again, although how much, I have no clue.

If I get it wrong, I am fucked, so I stay very cautious.

I honestly think it’s three or four minutes of neither of us speaking, just watching and listening to the water hitting the shore. The smell of the ocean is clean and cool, and the breeze is on us. It blows Ali’s hair around her face, and causes her to gather the blanket closer.

“I can get up, if you like,” I offer, “and let you have all of that. I don’t mind if you wrap yourself up. Don’t get cold. I’m fine.”

“That’s okay,” she says.

Or I could hold you, a voice inside me wants to say, but obviously I don’t.

“You don’t wanna just go back?”

Ali turns to look at me. “No, I don’t wanna go back. I wanna stay here, with you.”

I know that for a few seconds, it’s okay to look into her eyes, because she’s doing that, and she seems to want me to.

Why, I can’t say.

Then she glances down, and says quietly, “Can we lie back?”

“Of course.”

She lowers onto her side, like we did on Monday night, facing me, so I do the same, and I let her be the guide about the distance, which is not particularly far.

She reminds me of how it smells in the Bahamas. Tropical, warm, like a cocktail drink enjoyed under the shade of my mom’s favorite flowering plant, which she would always talk about while we’re there, the frangipani.

She pulls the blanket up behind her, but it doesn’t reach far over her.

She looks at me again, and I can’t remember if I’m supposed to be saying anything. I hope she hasn’t asked me a question.

Ali’s eyes always have so much going on in them; I’d forgotten what it was like to gaze into them.

Right now, I can see she’s taking me in, too, even if I don’t understand why. How little she has changed. Her face is so familiar: the crease at the edge of her eyes, the line of her cheeks. I’ve missed it more than I even realised, but I have permission to study her up close right now, and there’s no way I’ll miss the opportunity.

Then Ali closes her eyes, resting on her arm under her head, and there’s peace in her features. Like she knows I’m going to still be looking at her, and it’s fine if I do.

And so I watch her, wondering why I ever was stupid enough to do all those things I did.

I’m gonna stay here as long as she lets me, taking in every detail. I imagine the outline of her arm, slender under her sweater, where she has it between us, with her hand down on the blanket. I see the small bend in her knees, which she’s using to balance at rest on her side.

There’s a strip of skin at her hip which has been revealed by her sweater moving up, and I could reach my hand less than a foot and touch it, but I manage to keep that thought under control. I see her hip bone, but tear my eyes away.

When she opens her eyes again, whenever it is, I’ve laid my head down on my arm too, and she finds my gaze.

If I was gonna count, I would’ve gotten to thirty or forty at least, of neither of us breaking away. The ocean slowly delivers one wave after another in a soft crash, and that’s all we hear, other than the night time breeze, slow, fast, fast, slow.

Something’s happening. The feeling between Ali and me is rolling into something new with each few moments that pass. When she starts to smile a little, the way the expression changes her face catches in my chest.

Ali is the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen: I thought that the first time I laid eyes on her, and nothing’s changed.

The ache I have for her is enough to be a bright light that can make anything in life bearable, or a dark, hollow emptiness if she were to leave, but right now, it’s the light.

And she’s drawing me in, I’m not imagining it.

Her gaze drops slowly to my mouth, for a few seconds, and then back to my eyes.

She’s given me permission to lie here close to her, to look at her this way, but for some reason, I know it’s up to me to do the thing I can tell Ali’s asking me to, the thing I never, ever thought I’d do again.

The tips of two of my fingers fall lightly on her temple, brushing away a strand of hair.

I see her hold in her breath, see her eyes change in the moonlight, and I know I’m not meant to stop.

I trace her hairline from there, and the shape of her face, slowly, slowly, down to her where her cheek starts.

My hand comes gently to fit over that soft round skin, my fingers finding the line of her jaw. I watch her as I trace along there, from her ear toward her chin, and the heel of my palm finds the side of her lips.

Just as I’m thinking of running my fingers over them, of what I might be able to follow that with, Ali closes her eyes tightly, painfully, and turns away from me, rolling to sit up.

I spend seconds in agony, with my empty hand where she just was. I breathe deeply through the soreness in my heart, and then again, willing myself to become steady, as my throat goes thick, and I feel my eyes threatening to get warm; willing myself to let go of my disappointment, at least on the outside where she can see.

I sit up by her, resting my arms on my knees, propping my face there to look at her.

I can tell she senses it, because she speaks softly.

“I’m sorry, Johnny, I don’t wanna do that.”

“It’s okay,” I say, when I’m far from it. “Sorry, I thought you gave me some signals, but I’m real sorry I got it wrong. Don’t be mad?”

“I’m not mad,” she says quietly. She glances at me and then looks at where the tide is slowly creeping up toward us. “I did do that, and I shouldn’t have.”

“That’s okay, probably my fault.”

She smiles sadly and looks down. “Not everything is your fault, and you need to realise that. That certainly wasn’t.”

She points her toes and stretches her legs out in front, and then opens them a bit, starting to make lines in the sand inside her space with her finger.

“I’m real lost here,” I eventually say. “Can you please tell me how not to do the wrong thing, next?”

“You didn’t. Let’s just forget it… it’s fine.”

“If you say so.”

She waits, and I see the line between her brows go in as she stares at the sand. She says haltingly, “Johnny, I’m too scared to go back to you.”

I swallow, as those words shine on my past like a searchlight, and I know it’s exactly what I deserve.

Not that that makes it even a little bit bearable to hear, to take in.

But I try not to let my voice sound too hollow. “I get that.”

“Firstly, and I’m… so sorry to say this, because I’m not trying to hurt you: I’m worried this whole thing has been a plan, right from the start, to win me back. Telling me what I wanna hear, but none of it is true. I mean, I don’t really believe that, but there’s this small part of me that’s afraid I’m falling into a trap with you, that this has all been an illusion.”

I sigh deeply, wondering what to do about that sadness that settles, heavy like a boulder, inside my soul.

“I never thought I’d win you back,” I say emptily. “I never planned to try. All I wanted was to talk to you, and even that I didn’t really expect would happen. Everything else has been a bonus - you deciding to be friends with me, has just…”

I slowly shake my head, because there’s no way to explain how much it’s meant to me, let alone the way we’ve talked about the things that went wrong, the way those things have stopped feeling the way they used to feel inside me.

“I’m sorry,” Ali says, a tremor in her voice. “I don’t mean it, and I wish I could shake the feeling, because I _want_ to believe in you, Johnny. But this is where I’m at: you’re just so different. It’s too good to be true, the way you talk to me, now; it’s like you’ve grown up about six years overnight.”

“It sure as hell wasn’t overnight,” I argue, but without any passion. I _know_ what it took me to get here, but I guess I don’t have any idea how to explain it.

“And it _has_ been years,” I say, “and I’m still the same guy, fuck. Just… maybe an improved version.”

She’s looking at me. “But can you see it seems that way for me?”

“I guess. Ali, there’s literally no way for me to prove that wrong, is there? You’re not gonna believe anything I say. Do you know how much that sucks for me?”

For just a second it looks like her eyes are kinda glistening, but there’s not enough light for me to tell, because she’s looking down again.

“I _want_ to believe you... I really want to.”

I can see from here that she’s not lying. She’s got this torn expression, like she’s in some kind of agony of her own, although I doubt it’s even a fraction of the feeling I’ve got inside me right now.

“Is that the only reason?” I ask gently.

Maybe I can work on that, and be patient. Giving her time is probably the only way, in fact, the only possible chance to fix that, to make her believe in me, that this is real.

“Well, I mean, what would this be? Winter holidays are nearly over, and then we both go back to college and see each other every few months, or not at all? I can’t bear that idea.”

“It could be whatever you want, Ali, as much as you want.”

If she takes me back, she’s going to be stuck with me for the long haul or until she changes her mind. There’s no world where I break up with her.

“Long distance?”

“It could work. I could fly up, every weekend if you want. No big deal. We’d see each other plenty. You can call me anytime you like.”

“There would be way too much pressure on me. I’m sure I would hurt you sometimes, even though I wouldn’t mean to, and I’m worried this means too much to you, just like it used to. I don’t want to be responsible for your happiness: that’s too much weight. How could I possibly fulfil that?”

I’m staring at her, basically frowning, and she swallows and goes on, “And apart from that, if I’m going to be honest, it scares me how much I’m starting to care about you, Johnny. Sometimes it feels like if I don’t do something to stop it, it’s going to end up being more than the first time, and we’re not even _together_. I don’t understand why it has to be so intense with us, but it is, and we know where that got us.”

There’s a huge amount of stuff to process in what she just said, but right away, my initial response is that some of it is complete bullshit, as far as reasons go, because Ali wouldn’t need to do a single thing to make me happy except be herself, and other things she said are actually the exact opposite of a good excuse.

“I can’t believe this. After all the years of knowing you… us dating, breaking up, not talking, talking again, it’s gonna boil down to you not really hating the idea of being with me again, caring about me, and knowing that I really care about you a lot, but also at the same time, believing I might _not,_ that it might all be a lie?” I run my fingers through my hair in frustration. “Does that even make sense to you?”

“Not a lot, when you say it like that. I wish it wasn’t so complicated.”

She pulls her legs in and crosses them. She sighs and stares at me. “Actually, I _really_ wish that.”

“What does that look mean?”

“It means if you were just some guy, I’d be kissing you right now. In fact, I wouldn’t have waited so many nights to try, nowhere near.”

I groan and look at her accusingly. “You are cruel.”

She goes meek. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be. But you’re right, that was a terrible thing to say.”

I can’t resist the bait, though, since it might be the only thing I can salvage. “So, you’re still… you still think I’m…?”

She rolls her eyes slightly. “Of course. Maybe I didn’t ever stop. Once or twice my body sure as hell didn’t get the message we were through, anyway.”

I quickly stand to my feet and start walking to the sea, entering the water.

“Hello?” she calls, when I’m ankle deep. “What’s going on right now?”

“I’m drowning myself. Goodbye, Ali. I hope you have a nice life.”

I hear her laugh, and then she calls out, “Hey!”

I stop and turn around, and the cool water has made over the knees of my jeans.

“Yeah?” I say, my voice depressed. A wave comes in and I feel the water soaking higher still. My feet start to sink into the wet sand.

“Come back, please.”

“Will you stop tormenting me?”

“Yes. Now, come on, you’re getting your clothes wet.”

“Well, you could warm me up with that blanket, but apparently things are too complicated for that.”

She smiles. “Would you just get your ass back here?”

*

We’re still sitting there, ages later.

Ali’s put her hand on my knee, on my still damp jeans, and left it there, a gesture which shows how close and yet how far apart we are right now.

I’m staring at where she’s touching me, at how delicate and familiar her fingers look, and wondering what she’d do if I put my hand on top of hers.

Her voice comes from the silence, “You should be scared too, Johnny.”

“Scared of what?”

The only thing I’m afraid of is her never deciding to take me back, now that I know how she feels about some things, now that I know there’s a possibility of it happening, which is only a very new item in my life. One I’m still trying to take on board.

I glance up at her when she won’t reply, and I have to turn to look at the ocean again immediately, because her eyes are wet; this time I am sure beyond any doubt.

*

“Holy shit,” Bobby says, a couple hours later, when we’re on the way home. It’s his first statement about what he saw about how things are with me and Ali.

“Yup, pretty much.”

“I don’t even… it’s just so…” He blows out a breath.

“I know.”

“So you’re not allowed to, like, hit on her, but she’s allowed to be… you know, like that, with you?”

I smile as I look into the rear view mirror. I’m okay now; I’m feeling lighter. I just know, that somehow Ali and I _needed_ everything that happened back there, I can’t explain it. But none of it was a mistake, and none of it is going to go to waste.

By the time we were walking back, Ali was playful again, and we were okay, although things still felt different than at the start of the night; _good_ different.

And of course she was still wearing that sweater, which is the kind of thing that takes your mind off of other things in a way that few things can. I didn’t really bother as much with pretending not to see, didn’t put nearly as much effort in as I did on the way up. Whether she noticed or not, I don’t know, but her little smiles make me wonder.

I did not hate that walk.

Even better, there’s nobody in the world that could convince me that Ali did, either.

“It’s not about allowed,” I tell my friend, even though I know Bobby’s not gonna get it, that I’m not gonna be able to explain how much I like it, to him. I can’t even explain it to myself. But it is literally my favorite thing to have Ali be this way with me. Our old game - the part that Bobby saw when we were all together, the part that happened on the walk back, the part that has been happening the last few times I've seen Ali, I guess, especially on Christmas Eve and when she called me the next day - it makes me feel like we’re together, even though we aren’t.

Yet.

I think I’m gonna try adding that last word, in my mind at least.

It feels maybe stupidly hopeful, but other times it feels… right. But in every way, completely unreal.

“She has some rules,” I say, “and it’s my job to know what they are, and keep up when they change.”

Bobby shakes his head. “She’s gonna drive you crazy.”

“She already is.”

It’s entirely the point, Bobby.

“And what about after we left?”

I bite my cheek. “No details, but she – we – well… something almost happened. But it didn’t.”

I see him perk up. “Is that, like, the first time?”

“Yeah.”

“Fuck. Well, maybe that’s a good sign. Progress?”

“Maybe. And, well, there is one other thing, I guess. She did end up asking me to pick her up on Wednesday. Which reminds me. I kinda figured you’d start doing that with Barbara, now? I mean, for next Saturday, obviously.”

We’re all gonna ride to Jimmy’s on Wednesday, for New Year’s, everyone with a bike, and then we’re gonna go from there, all together, out up in the hills for a while.

“Well, I mean, sure,” Bobby says. “And I was thinking about that for Wednesday, too. Didn’t know how she’d feel about the bike, was the only thing, but I guess we’ve sorted that out.” Then he pauses, and I see Bobby’s head turn my way. “Hey! So Ali asked you to pick her up for the _ride_?”

“Right,” I say with a smile, since he finally gets it.

“And you’re sure something didn’t happen back there, and you’ve just had a mental blank?”

“Pretty sure.”

“Huh.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first item in Chapter 14: Johnny picks Ali up for the ride.


	14. Wednesday 5, Part 1: New Year's Eve, 1986

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Caution – long party ahead, another 3 chapter one! Party all night like it’s 1987.
> 
> Thanks so much for your comments, chats and likes about last chapter. It’s been quite lovely to engage with you about it, and I want to keep doing that, as much as you’re comfortable with :)
> 
> Thanks also for popping by the Jimmy fic! Hope you keep enjoying both of the related works when they update :)
> 
> Technical note: I hope you can see the two themes I’m currently balancing in their relationship narrative here, because it is super duper not easy for me to do, especially to try to show them as separate themes, which they are :) On the one hand, we have Ali’s fears, and her growing feelings, and her hesitation to come back, which hurts her and she knows (and hates) that it hurts Johnny. She’s working through it as best she can. On the other hand, their chemistry just never goes away: their flirtation, any game that she plays, any fire she wants to give him, is Johnny’s favorite thing, and he craves it, because it’s their old jam, and it will always be part of them. But she’s not playing a game about the emotional part, and I realise it is very complex to read when both of those things are happening at the same time. Like Ali said, she doesn’t know why it has to be so intense with them, but it is. It do be like that. 
> 
> Okay, here we go :)

We’re gonna go through until daylight, so New Year's Eve won’t start until it’s basically dark.

It’s about four thirty when I roll into Ali’s street to pick her up.

She asked me to, on the beach that night, while we walked back to Jimmy’s. I’m not sure what it means that she’s basically invited herself onto my bike, for three times today, if you include the fact that I guess I’ll drop her home in the morning after the party, except that it’s _something._

I’m idling the engine for a few seconds and then I turn it off. I wonder whether to go to the door, but since this isn’t a date, not exactly, and since I have no idea what it _is_ , I don’t.

I’m taking my gloves off, and my helmet, and Ali must have heard me arrive, because she’s coming out on the porch, standing between those square pillars and waving. She’s got a jacket on, and she’s zipping it up as she comes down the steps to the road.

I’m ruffling up my hair, and then smoothing it down, and then when she’s standing next to the bike, I hand her the helmet I had tied down onto the back.

“You remember how to do this?”

“I think it’ll come back to me,” she says as she grabs it from me.

“I wasn’t sure you’d want to, or I woulda asked you sooner.”

“I wouldn’t miss this. I’ve been trying to remember our last ride.”

I give her a tight look. “I’m pretty offended you don’t. That was a, uh, special day we had. Just you and I.”

When she looks at me blankly, I add, “At Hidden Springs.”

I can’t help but enjoy the fact that I got away with that, because she looks sheepish, smiling, but avoiding looking at me.

“Oh. Yeah.”

“And now she remembers.”

“Cut it out,” she says, as she pulls the helmet on, and I follow.

I hope she remembers, too, that I now know she has some kind of feelings for me, even if she wishes she didn’t, because that whole conversation, and what happened before and afterwards, sure as hell wasn’t in my imagination. But I guess I’m supposed to pretty much act like that’s nothing, or at least, I figure I’m going to have way more luck if I don’t remind her about it.

She climbs on behind me, and we both fit into a comfortable spot.

I speak up so my voice carries through the casing. “It’s no good putting your hands on my hips like that. You gotta hold on properly, remember? I don’t wanna leave you behind.”

If she didn’t want to be close to me, she shouldn’t have asked me to come and pick her up on my bike, as she knows well enough what this involves in that way. I take her hands at her wrists, and pull them across low, in front of me, and she clasps them together.

“Better,” I say, as I feel her come more against my back, and the click of her helmet touch mine.

I tug on my gloves and start up the bike again, and pull away slowly enough for Ali to get used to the feel of this again, that she’s gotta trust me to keep us upright, and focus just on holding on to me.

It doesn’t take her long. Maybe like me, she remembers doing this together, so many times I lost count.

By the time we’re halfway along Ventura, she’s pretty much a natural again. She’s remembered she always found it more comfortable for her, easier, to just lean against my back with her head resting the way that she used to. Her legs fit around mine like she belongs back there, and she shadows my movement. The buildings go by, and each time I stop for a red light, I feel her body press in with her momentum, and the opposite when we go again.

On the freeway, I can tell she trusts me to go the speed limit, and I do, or just over. There’s a lot of traffic, even for LA, but I can go between it sometimes, so it doesn’t slow us down so much.

It takes us a while to get through Santa Monica, which is gonna be very busy tonight, but I find myself not minding, because it means her being back there for a little longer. I’m getting worryingly used to the feeling, and I can’t really help wondering what she’s making of it.

At Jimmy’s, I drive into the turnout, where there are a bunch of bikes tonight, and cars, and I let Ali get off first.

She’s sliding her helmet up, and combing her hair with her fingers, while I climb off.

“Thanks.”

“No problem,” I say, once I’ve got everything off. “Here, give me that.”

I carry the helmets while we walk to the back door, my fingers on the warmth she left behind in hers. She unzips her jacket, and underneath, she’s got on a button down shirt, with a pale blue v-neck over the top.

So, not a sweater with no bra, and no anything, underneath, like Saturday. That’s the conclusion I’ve come to about that, now that I know Ali feels something for me, because I imagined and analysed the options enough, considering her bare shoulders and how cold she was, and that movement I couldn’t help but notice, and that’s the only one that makes sense of everything.

Which she either did to cause me physical pain, because she had to know I’d notice, or because she thought there was even a small chance that on Saturday she might have let me put my hand underneath there.

I realise it’s almost definitely the first one, because it wouldn’t surprise me if Ali wants to drive me basically insane with how much I want her, for however long it takes us until the day I hope for comes, but I like to picture the second one being a possibility, even a remote one.

She says, as if she can read where my thoughts are, “So are you mad at me about what happened up the beach?”

She’s definitely talking about how we almost kissed, and she’s talking playfully enough that I need to concentrate on not smiling, because there’s no way she’d be talking that way if she wasn’t still thinking about it, thinking in the kind of way that maybe next time, she’s not planning to stop me.

I just have to work out when that next time is. I have to work out when she’s gonna actually be _ready_ for it, but I wonder if maybe I will be able to tell, after all. I think I will.

I can wait.

It’s easier than you can imagine, when she gives me something like that to work with.

“I wondered if we were going to pretend it never did,” I reply pretty evenly. “No, I’m not mad.”

She smiles but says nothing to that, cos we’re walking down the hallway now. We leave the helmets and jackets near the door, and I’m down to my t-shirt, Ali to her short sleeved shirt with that sweater vest.

Jimmy and Jennifer have put streamers up, mostly blue and purple, and some balloons hang in huge bunches from various corners of the room and other places. I can smell food coming from the kitchen.

It’s already pretty packed, and some people have spotted us and are coming up, so I know Ali and I will probably go do that for a while, and find each other later on.

Her friends are watching music videos on the beanbags, the whole group of them with not a guy in sight, and Connie and Nicole lead her over there to join in.

I spend a few minutes with the guys who came up to greet me, and Aaron gets me a beer. Then I say goodbye to them, and walk past Greg and Samantha, who are flirting on the sofas, and head out to Dutch, Tommy and some others who are standing outside in a big group. My friends make way for me to stand in between them.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Tommy says. “Did I just see you and Ali arrive together?”

Dutch leans in to smile at me and puts his hand on my shoulder. “For real?”

“No,” I have to regretfully admit. “I mean, yes, we did, but it doesn’t mean what you think.”

Dutch cocks an eyebrow at me and says very deliberately, “You picked her up?”

“Sure.”

“On your _bike_ ,” Tommy adds.

“Right…”

They exchange a look like I’m a moron, and I elbow Dutch in the ribs, since he’s closer.

“Hey, fuck off,” he protests, and pulls back from me.

“You fuck off, both of you. And keep your voices down. You’re not going to ruin this for me.”

Dutch says, “I thought you just said nothing’s happening?”

“It’s not, yet.”

“Oh shit,” Dutch says, his face keen with interest.

“I knew it,” Tommy sighs, with the exact opposite emotion, like this is somehow bad news. “Something changed, huh? Something happened?”

I suck my cheeks in. “It’d be more accurate to say something nearly happened.”

“Right. So now it’s a matter of time, then.”

It’d be great if he could shut up and not jinx this, and cut out that tone of his, too.

“Yeah? Well, you’re sure as fuck gonna have to be okay with it, if it does.”

“If, or when?” Dutch asks.

“When,” Tommy says sulkily. “And I’ll be fine, you won’t hear a peep outta me. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“It’s not gonna be like that, this time.”

“I hope not, for your sake.”

“C’mon,” Dutch cuts in. “Give Johnny some credit. He’s not gonna screw it up if he gets another shot, right?”

“Right. Thank you,” I add with emphasis, in a way that Tommy knows I’d really appreciate it if he was in my corner, too.

“Well,” he offers, resigned. “You better get moving. You don’t have long to make it happen.”

“Tell me about it.”

Time for a change of subject. “So,” I say, “Dutch. Do you have a girlfriend? Is that what’s happening?”

He’s told me a little, but I also have eyes, and it seems to be going well so far. He smirks, and gives a quick glance through the glass, in the direction of Ali’s group, although we can’t see them from here with all the people in the way in between.

“Yeah, I guess I do.”

“Do you need any pointers?” I offer.

He sticks a finger up. “Screw you. You don’t need to pretend I’ve never gone with a girl before.”

“Yeah, there was that one time, right?” Tommy mocks him.

Dutch chuckles. “I know what I’m doing.”

“Okay,” I say, because this really is the only way we know how to be with each other, “well, you just let me know if you get confused, at any time.”

He’s grinning widely. “Seriously, you need to shut your mouth.”

*

Jimmy puts some music on out there some time later, and it brings most people outside. The girls start dancing a bit, and some of them drag guys to join with them, but for a while most of us just stand around drinking, talking and watching.

There’s a big crowd, and the lines eventually blur between where the dancing is or isn’t, and it isn’t hard to work my way over to Ali.

“Hey,” she greets me, smiling up at me.

She’s tied her hair back into that pony tail she used to wear out on the field, which was always real cute, and she puts her bare arms up around my neck, and surrounds me with about a dozen sensations at once: her hands touching my skin, the flowers, still smelling soft and alive, the kind of smell you just want to surround yourself with, the weight of her arms, her being right inside my space, and her enjoyment of the music, the way she’s moving around, swaying.

It’s intoxicating.

I guess she has become pretty comfortable with touching me all of a sudden, after our ride.

“Are we dancing?” I ask, stepping a little closer, and putting my hands lightly around her waist. I mean, I’m not really moving. Even if I could get my brain to think further than the fact that I have my arms around her, I don’t dance, but she is, which I think counts.

“I believe that’s what it’s called,” she says, and doesn’t move away from me, from how I’m holding her.

“Okay, just wanted to check.”

She’s so beautiful it hurts. Everything, everyone else, is pretty much blocked out as I look down at her, at the little smile on her perfect lips.

And I could just about _kill_ Jennifer when she shuts the music down, a few minutes later.

“Hey guys!” she calls to everybody, her voice way over the other side of the patio. I can’t see her through the crowd around us, but all I can think of is you have to be fucking kidding me with that timing.

It’s too late: Ali pulls away and so I disengage, and we find a space where we can look over at Jennifer.

Jimmy’s at her side, and he calls out, “Time to eat. And then some of us are gonna go for a ride. I don’t know for how long, but given that I’ll be leaving whoever in charge, please don’t destroy my house.”

He gets a few laughs, and a voice, Josh’s, says, “No promises.”

“Thanks again, everyone. We’ve only got the weekend after this. It’s been the best time, seeing you all. I know we’ll get busy again, soon, but let’s promise we’re gonna hang out whenever we can, yeah?”

Lots of people agree to that, and I speak up. “Thanks, Jimmy. And you, Jennifer. I think all of us wanna say that. Thanks for letting us hang around and eat your food, and drink everything we can find in your bar. I knew there was a reason I was friends with you.”

“Welcome,” Jimmy says, grinning, and people start clapping, which is nice.

*

There’s a group of about twelve riders, and most of them are bringing a girl, so when we leave, we put a dent in the numbers.

Susan makes an offhand comment about danger, from her seat on the sofa with Nicole, which Ali basically ignores, and Barbara just shrugs and smiles at her friend. Ali’s following me out the back, and pulling her jacket back on.

Then everyone’s down at the bikes and working on helmets; some of the bikes are starting up and filling the roadside with rumbling noise and the smell of exhaust. Ali climbs on behind me, this time more confident in knowing how to do it properly: I feel her body settle down right against me, and her arms wrap around me.

We all set off. Dutch and Tina are going on separate bikes, which I soon realise is so they can weave in and out of all of us, racing each other.

We ride up to the canyon, as we planned, and I hadn’t particularly noticed anyone bringing beers, but they appear when we’re up there, when we’re all getting off.

We’re hanging out at the lookout, some people leaning with their backs on the wooden rail, and others sitting on the benches. It’s quite a bit cooler up here, and windy. There’s one lamp post, with a cool white light, not super bright, and other than that, the moon, so there’s enough light to see, but not particularly well or far, and I only have a vague sense of the shapes of rocks across the canyon, none of the view you get in the daylight.

Ali and Jennifer are talking where they’re sitting on the bench, and it looks like they’ve excluded Jimmy, so he heads on over to me instead.

“So, let me guess,” he begins. “The two of you have worked out you still have feelings, and finally worked out that the other one likes you back, but you’re still having trouble getting it together?”

I laugh quietly. “Lay off.”

“I never knew you were this clueless, Johnny. Do you need me to draw you a map?”

“There’s a couple things that are stopping her, that’s all.”

My past self, mainly. My worst enemy.

Some things you do, some mistakes, follow you, and it can be hard to ever get rid of them. A lesson I know well enough, now, but I’m not going to give up, not now.

And all that bullshit Ali said, about worrying that I care too much, or that things are too heated with us, is not relevant. Because it wouldn’t matter, if she wasn’t worried I’d suddenly turn around and be an asshole again, that I’d blow it all up.

I’m not paying any attention to those last few issues, because since when is caring about someone who you’re with, a bad thing?

Jimmy asks, “Stopping her for how long?”

“Don’t know. Maybe not long. Could be forever, how the fuck should I know?”

He gives me a sympathetic look, which I appreciate. “So, you’re just gonna wait?”

“What choice do I have? Besides, I’d wait the rest of my life, for her.”

“It’s good that you realise that about yourself.” He clinks his bottle on mine. “Makes me have hope for you.”

*

We’ve been up here for ages, and people have trickled away in pairs, to have some time by themselves. Even the few guys who came up alone are standing in a group over by the bikes, and Ali and I are the only people left at the lookout, with a bunch of empty beer bottles left here from everyone else.

We’re both sitting on the long bench on the side, out of the wind, one of us at each end, with our legs stretched out in between. We’re leaning against the wooden uprights behind us, and talking a little. Also just looking at each other in relaxed silence, which seems to be something we’re doing, now, since the beach.

Out of nowhere, she says, “Number four. I wish I hadn’t made you wait a year, more. Looking back, it feels like we wasted a lot of time.”

I try to hide the shocked reaction I’m sure Ali’s fishing for, by taking a swig of my last beer, but it’s difficult. Leave it to her, to think it’s okay to talk about having sex with me, make me think about it, when I’m not even allowed to kiss her, even one time.

I raise my eyebrows. “That’s what’s on your list of things you wish you could change?”

There’s a teasing smirk. “I was surprised it wasn’t on yours.”

Yeah, like she’d have ever talked to me again if I’d brought that up, all those nights ago.

“You might remember, I wasn’t hugely in favor of that decision at the time, although I went along with it.”

“Oh, I remember.”

“So, it’s good to hear you say you were wrong.”

She laughs and looks down at her hands. “Glad you’re enjoying it. I thought it was only fair I tell you that one, finally, to make up for the other night.”

She’s a little liar, and I think she’s hoping I call her on it, so that’s why I’m not going to.

We both know that saying something like that is going to make it infinitely worse for me, not better, and that’s exactly what she wants. I can only hope that somewhere, at the end of this road, she has a real reward waiting for me, and it’s going to make everything that happens until then, more than worthwhile. Hopefully I can make it there, before she kills me.

“Right,” I say neutrally.

“Johnny?” she says, and the joking tone is gone now. She’s serious, hesitant.

“Yeah?”

“Can you tell me that you’re not gonna hurt me, and make me believe it?”

“Yes,” I say steadily. “I will get it wrong, sometimes, but I’m gonna make sure it’s never very bad, and we’re gonna work it out. I know we can.”

Maybe she noticed by my words, I’ve started to talk about us as something that will be happening in the future, that I’m planning for, for whenever she’s ready, and no longer just as a possibility.

She rests the side of her head against the post, and watches me until everybody comes back.


	15. Wednesday 5, Part 2: New Year’s Eve, 1986

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, everyone!! Not much else to say this time, except that your continued engagement just means the absolute world to me. This is the story which is very special to me, which I’ve put so much of me into for months, sometimes thinking of little else while I was trying to write it, and to have you here with me, liking it, is just the best thing ever.
> 
> Jimmy's spin-off has been updated with Chapter 2, but this is a late note, so I'll pop in in the next chapter too.

When we get back to Jimmy’s, the dancing is back in full swing, although everyone’s inside now.

The music’s up pretty loud, and I can only guess a guy has set it going, because it’s some thumping rock and roll. There’s a bunch of shit on the coffee table: bottles, plates, spilled food; and some on the floor: some decorations, various pieces of clothing, and Jimmy loudly announces, “So this is how it is,” as he leads us all in.

Some of the other guys cheer to see us all coming back. Most of us throw our jackets and helmets into one of the rooms off to the side, and Dutch follows this by undoing his denim shirt so it’s open over his chest down to his belt.

It’s getting on for eleven, but we’ve still got a long night ahead, and me and the guys head over to the bar to get things started properly. Ali and her friends go off to do their own thing.

Dutch lines up a row and pours us each a shot of scotch, which we throw back, and he refills us from a few different bottles, until Tina comes up and grabs the one he’s holding.

“How about you let someone responsible do that?”

She fills our shot glasses one last time, and then takes a long drink from the bottle, with her other hand on Dutch’s stomach, swallowing with her eyes on him.

She’s changed clothes, really quickly I guess, into a short leather miniskirt, and on the top she’s down to a skimpy white tank, and even though the last thing I’m trying to do is look, her defined arms don’t really distract from how well she fills it out. The tank goes barely halfway down to her skirt, and pretty much all of the other four of us try to keep our eyes away from everything that’s going on, which is quite a lot. Her abs are way more toned than I had thought a girl’s could be, and as Dutch picks her up a bit to pull her into him for a kiss, the skirt doesn’t really hide very much about her athletic legs, either.

Tommy puts his arm around me. “Think it’s time we left them to it.”

We all walk away, laughing, Tommy dropping dirty hints, although he stops when Erin comes up.

“Did you get me a drink?” she teases.

“Oh shit. Sorry.”

They’re heading back that way to the bar, and Jimmy and Jennifer have some things they need to do, too.

Bobby and I are left, and we come to a stop, a few yards away from Ali and Barbara, who are standing together and waiting for us to join them, smiling.

Bobby says into my ear, “Make it count.”

“Believe me, I’m trying.”

We’ve taken too long, because Barbara comes over and takes Bobby off into some free space so they can dance.

Ali steps up to me and picks up one of my hands. Her little nod backwards, and the way she’s pulling on me, means I need to follow her, because it looks like I’m gonna get to go back to what we were doing before the ride, thank god.

A drum beat starts up as the song changes, and I hear Tommy’s deafening shout, a bellow from behind me. “Come on! How many of you can feel the noise?”

Everyone basically screams, and the song gets going. Ali starts to bounce on her feet, and then she holds both of my hands, so I _have_ to move as well, which I grudgingly do, although I don’t dance quite so much as she does.

“I don’t remember you liking this kind of music,” I say, completely entranced by her, and speaking loudly so she can hear me.

“Yeah well, Tina’s my friend, and she’s pretty persistent.”

“Girl’s got good taste.”

Ali throws back her head and laughs. “In some things, maybe.”

Dutch and Tina have come over to dance too, right near us. I guess Tina looks like the girls in some of those rock videos do - apart from her glasses, which I often don’t notice anymore - with her long hair, with her clothes, with the way she’s stepping suggestively around Dutch, running her hand around his shoulders as she walks back around to face him in front, and then he catches her around the waist while she tips backwards with her head dipping down toward the carpet and lifting up again, coming right up near his face, grinning, and then kissing him.

“I’ve never seen him looking at a girl quite like that,” I tell Ali, when I look away with a smile.

“Yeah, no shit. He’s completely gone.”

“Not completely, not yet. But I think, yeah, maybe he will be. Not sure I’ve ever seen a girl look at him that way, either.”

I’m starting to realise, way more than I thought, how good they are together, but not just that: there’s the fact that I know she’s the first girl to ever give Dutch the message that like, well, like he was really worth something to someone, to a girl. That makes me feel things I can never say to Dutch, but I really don’t hate that I feel them.

“We did well, huh?” Ali says to me.

I could remind her she had basically _nothing_ to do with that particular couple, but I decide I’ve said it enough times, and she obviously won’t stay believing it for long before trying to take the credit again.

“Although,” she adds, “he is turning my friend into an exhibitionist.”

“I’m not sure that should surprise you. Did you forget, he’s Dutch?”

“Right.”

By now, people are shouting that they got something to say, and that it’s better to burn out, and I’m surprised to see Ali knows the words.

We dance with her arms around my neck again, and my hands on the back of her waist, and she lets her hair down so that it floats when she bounces, and she has to push it out of her eyes sometimes.

We’re getting warm, like I guess everyone else is, and I’m pretty into feeling her body heat where I’m holding her. I can see just a little line of moisture along her forehead, and I wonder what it would feel like to kiss that away.

I settle for reaching in when her hair’s next bothering her, when she’s about to swipe it away, and I do it instead. She lets me, and once I realise she isn’t going to move my hand away, I tuck her hair behind her ear, like I’ve been wanting to do from the very first night.

I see her swallow, and a second or two later, she stops moving, and so do I.

She looks at me, and then at my chest for a while, and her hands slip down a bit, no longer loose behind my neck, but flat with her palms on the shoulders of my t-shirt. I haven’t let go of her; I’ve got both arms around her, and she hasn’t moved away.

“What?” I ask, with just enough volume that I know she’ll hear me. “What’s that I can see that you want to say to me?”

Her eyes come up, and when she chews her lip, I’m hypnotised. I can see almost a tremble there, like she’s afraid of something.

“And what about if I get it wrong? What about if I hurt you?”

My heart starts to race, and the hope that flares is like a punch in my chest.

“Same deal.”

I can see how nearly the battle is won, see it rage in Ali’s eyes as she stares up at me and swallows.

I add, maybe loudly enough, “I’m sure you can make it up to me.”

“Am I gonna regret this?”

“No,” I say simply.

“You’re that sure?”

I look at her without saying anything, letting her find the answer in my face for herself.

She drops her hands, only to unwrap mine from around her, and take one of them into hers.

She’s walking us through the crowd, and whether anyone’s looking at us, I wouldn’t have a clue. We might as well be the only two people in the world.

We’re not going up to the deck, I think, as we pass the stairs, and we’re not going to the patio either, apparently, because we’re heading over to the beach steps.

She lets go of my hand then, and when we’re down on the sand, she kicks off her shoes and bends down to pick up some of the blankets from a pile, that’s been left here for later.

There’s a party up the beach a little way, to our right, and Ali only looks at me one more time before she starts to walk away slowly across the sand, in the other direction. I follow her on bare feet.

Maybe it’s not where I’d like to be with her when I first get to hold her in my arms, and for anything we do after that, whether it’s sex, or not that much; maybe it’s not where I might’ve dreamed of, but the most important thing is, I need to be wherever Ali’s going to be right now.

Not far from Jimmy’s, where I can still hear the music, there are some rocks, where there’s a break in the houses, and they form a sheltered little area, which is where she goes.

It’s where she lays a blanket out, and sits down in the middle with her legs bent up in front. She looks up at me, and I kneel before her, as she slides her feet apart and pulls on the front of my t-shirt to bring me to her.

I walk in on my knees, closing the distance. She drops slowly backwards, drawing me after her, and I come down onto my hands either side of her body, as I feel her make a space for me to lie over her, her legs open around me.

I let some of my weight go onto her, and my knees take the rest as I hold myself up on my elbows up either side of her head.

My finger touches her brow where her sweat has already cooled in the night air, and then I trace the shape of her lips, like I never quite made it to do on Saturday.

She’s obviously completely perfect, just as she used to be, and I can barely dare to believe in this moment.

Her hand lifts up to the side of my face and rests there, warm, soft. Familiar.

I know I can’t tell her I love her tonight, so I will wait weeks, months, and maybe I’ll wait until she says it to me, but it won’t stop me thinking it.

Ali’s eyes shine as she combs slowly through my hair, and I feel the chill from my damp skin being exposed, the heat from her touch there.

There’s so much of her face I want to explore, let alone any other part of her.

After she has touched over me, I find her hands and draw them up above her head, where the sand begins, lacing mine into them.

And I slowly bend down to her.

She closes her eyes, and we kiss. I kiss her, like a gift from another place that I never thought I’d get to have again.

Her lips are impossibly soft and she turns her head to meet me just how I remember, as we fit tenderly together.

I feel the gentle movements of her lips on mine, imagine that maybe I can feel her smiling like I am, before our kiss deepens and she opens to kiss me with that lovely pressure.

I tighten my fingers, lost in her forever now, I think, my soul begging her not to make me let her go, ever again.

There’s the sacred moment when our kiss becomes full, the slide of her tongue over mine for the first time, and my breath comes like an afterthought, something too hard to draw, when I need to focus on this closeness she’s made for me.

I feel the passion from her, hear a single sound of contentment, the deepest relief, which shakes me, and I kiss her like my life’s been building to this moment, which I guess it has.

Ali’s pulling out of my hands so that she can slide hers up my arms, and her fingers stop just under my t-shirt on each side, dragging it up a little, and digging in to caress me.

I don’t know what she’s got in mind for us, although the blankets make me wonder if it might be a lot, but she also just might not want to get cold again.

But, not that I would admit it to anyone, I won’t really mind too much if this is it tonight, kissing her like this. I really won’t, because I’m sure she’ll let me do more soon enough, let me take every piece of her, and we have plenty of time for that, now she’s come back to me.

Of course, I will do anything, everything, Ali wants to do with me.

I’m worried that I’m too heavy to stay here for as long as I feel like spending kissing her, so I gently draw her with me as I roll over, and bring her into the crook of my arm, hardly breaking our rhythm.

She lifts her knee up across my body, across where my excitement for her is already stirring. She melds into me, and her arm goes across my chest to rest on my shoulder as we kiss.

She’s getting up on her elbow a bit so she can reach me better, and I cradle the arm she has splayed over me, my fingers finding the shapes of her forearm and her wrist, her elbow.

I’m still doing that, running my hand up her arm, when we stop, and she looks at me, from a few inches away.

“I’ve missed doing that,” she says softly, and there’s a weight in her words that makes my heart mess up its rhythm, come up high in my chest.

“Not as much as I have.”

“Don’t be so sure.”

She’s still gazing at me, and I can’t bear any more of that right now, can’t bear to see how much Ali means it, and that it isn’t just about kissing me. Even though I also _need_ to know it, more than anything. It’s so strong I’m going to have to take it in doses so it doesn’t kill me, but I will, until I’ve had all of it, taken it all into myself.

I tighten my arm to bring her closer so can press a kiss to her forehead.

“Trust me.”

She sits up for just as long as it takes to peel her little sweater vest off, lifting it slowly over her head while her eyes are on me, and then she brings the other blanket with her when she lies back down in my arms, draping the warmth over us, and covering the bare parts of skin, our arms.

I’m playing with her hair again, using my fingers to move it to the side and she smiles at me.

My Ali.

I’m guessing I’m invited to think about the buttons on her shirt, but I don’t rush, kissing her a few times while she runs her hand over my chest. She finds the bottom of my shirt, and pulls it out from my jeans, sliding her hand properly underneath, up my body.

I tremble a little when it tickles, smiling at her as one finger and then another start to explore my stomach, and I draw my breath in at the sensitive responses she takes from my skin, and I feel her moving higher and higher, and drawing my shirt up with her hand.

I cup her chin, and then let my hand fall down her neck, finding the top of her blouse, and watching her for the approval that comes when I begin to open it with one hand, slowly, two buttons, three, and then I stop to touch her pure, smooth neck, press along her collarbone.

I hear her exhale, and she finds me to kiss me again. My hand can’t resist the overwhelming draw of her rounded skin, her breast, hidden mostly by the tight fabric of her bra, and I come to rest holding her softly in my hand, just my thumb moving slowly along the top edge of the bra, where her skin disappears underneath, and then across where I can feel her hard little peak, as our kiss increases.

At some point, the music coming from Jimmy’s, and that other party, stops. Not long after, there are cheers, and the distant sound of party favors for an extended time, and I realise it must be 1987, now.

The music starts again.

My Ali undoes the rest of her shirt for me, and lets me touch her there for a long time, all around the bra she has on, of the palest lacy blue, and my hands eventually find her hip bone and move along it to the dip of her stomach.

She interrupts me, pulling my shirt up, right up, and I remove it completely, and then pull the blanket over us, when she lays her warm skin against me. I’m praying that people are distracted by their celebrations. Because if anyone disturbs us, while we are sharing this, and won’t take a hint to fuck off, then despite any previous promises I may have made to Ali, there could be bloodshed.

I touch her immaculate stomach while she bends to kiss my exposed skin, her feather light touch on my chest driving me crazy.

When my fingers find the waistband of her jeans, I play over it, watching for any sign I’m going too far, and then I can’t help sliding underneath a little, touching more of her firm skin.

There’s a little sound from her, a good sound, and she’s kissing me again while I undo the button.

My fingers spread across the smooth skin of her belly again, before I slip down to the band of her panties. She shivers and sighs when I touch her there, and so I push my fingers underneath and begin to touch the very lowest part of her body before her secret place.

I’m going crazy, thinking about the last few seconds before I touch her there, and whether she’s going to let me inside her tonight, what that’s going to be like whenever she does.

She’s tensing up, I can feel that in the muscles of her stomach, and her breathing is coming quicker in our kiss, and I draw out the teasing touch for only a little longer before I slide my hand further down and find her silky heat.

She whimpers, and the sound undoes me. I touch her with wonder, with disbelief at how good it feels inside her folds. Her body responds automatically to push in against me. My hand is tightly trapped by her jeans, so if she decides she’d like more than my soft touches, that will be up to her to help me with, but until then, I stroke gently over her slick skin, and she starts to whimper again.

I fight not to groan at what this is like to do, that she’s allowing me this, that every part of her is so perfect.

I can manage to get inside her jeans just a little further, but it’s hard to move my hand when I do, so I decide quickly that it will feel better for her if I just gently touch her where I can reach. I just use one finger, the rest bracing my hand and holding a space as best I can, so that I can slide across familiar shapes that make her tremble, and kiss me like she’s losing control of herself.

Ali breaks away, breathing hard as she looks at me, and I wait to see what we’re doing now, stilling my hand.

She sits up, causing me to take my hand out, but then she pulls her shirt down her shoulders, and off, eyes on me. After a few seconds I fail and have to look down, because I can see her properly in the moonlight, the lush shape of her in that pretty bra, the shadows that frame the edges of her curves.

I’m biting my lip without realising, until it hurts, and I look up at her, a hopeless look, I know, because I’m so lost in her now.

 _Please_ , I think, although I don’t know what. Anything, just let me hold you, just let me do whatever you want me to.

When she lies back and starts to slip her jeans down, my eyes close on a sigh, feeling hot, and then I remember to look, I _need_ to look, because she’s lying there in pale blue: beautiful, sexy, my angel. She comes back to me, her bare skin all over mine, smelling so good I can’t get enough, my jeans the only real clothes either of us now have on.

Her hand plays over my chest, over my stomach, and I know she wants to me do that again, wants me to make her start to go tense again.

I slip back inside the lace, free to touch her now. When my fingers move inside her body, she kisses me with gratitude, and I listen for the sounds as I cherish her, starting to work out what she likes, and how it might have changed. It’s something which I plan to put a lot of time into when I’m with her, until I know everything there is to know, and she needs me as much as I need her.

I have more confidence and more patience than I did, and I’m sure she notices.

“Please, Johnny…” she begs, her body moving slowly as she chases the feeling. “Tell me you’re not gonna stop doing that…”

“Never,” I murmur, and I lift up so that she’s the one laying down on her back, and I can be the one kissing her, in time with how I touch her. Her sounds are growing louder, and I try my best to stifle them with my mouth.

I remember, stupidly, that I used to rush past this bit sometimes, and at the start, not even do it at all, as if it wasn’t possibly the best part of the whole thing, watching Ali start to become helpless, as we both know where I’m taking her.

Using the feedback she’s given me, I increase the pressure where I know it will count the most. Soon she cries softly, screwing her eyes shut, and closing her fingers around my arm, and I kiss her just in time as her body shakes underneath me and most of the sound she makes is quieted by my mouth.

She gripping me tighter than I think she knows she’s doing, so that it almost hurts, and I love the thought of that, that she’s in another place because of me.

I lie back and stroke her stomach gently while she comes back from drifting, not hurrying her, watching the way her happiness shows in the little details on her face.

She turns to me after some time. I can’t say what I’m thinking about her, so I settle for, “You’re so beautiful, Ali.”

The back of her fingers stroke my jaw.

She’s still smiling, still closes her eyes now and then, when she wants to sigh in satisfaction, and I draw her against me again so I can hold her, making sure the blanket is covering us properly.

She wraps her arm across me, and settles in like she knows she belongs there.

After a while, I feel her hand move across my chest again, and then down to my stomach.

She doesn’t stop when she hits my jeans, surprising me by sliding her hand over me on the denim, where my attraction for her, for what it was like to do that with her, is shockingly clear.

A sound comes from my throat, and she strokes over me again. I know I need to let her do that, to find out about me if that’s what she wants, to see what everything’s like, again.

It feels amazing. She’s touching along me, finding my shape, where my jeans are keeping me tightly contained, and I’m forced to stifle a groan, which makes her turn to look up and smile at me.

She watches my face for a while, then, while she touches me, and I can feel my heart start to pick up, everything start to build a little, and she seems to love it when she sees me react in a way she can notice.

But depending on whether anything else is going to happen, if we’re going there, it’s not like I’m going to need any help in that department, so after a little while, I move her hand away, back to my stomach, and I hear her give a soft chuckle.

“No more of that?” she asks quietly, smiling like a tease.

I shake my head slightly, trying to fend off the hope that of course is now fairly strong, that Ali’s going to let me make love to her tonight.

“No? Then what about if I take this off, instead?”

She pushes the blanket away and reaches behind her back, and then pulls her bra away, and then she’s lying there in the cool air, waiting, like a work of fucking art.

I reach for her, my hand covering one breast, and I begin to touch her the way I could’ve only dreamed of. This part of her is divine beyond my memory, and when I kiss her there, the soft parts, the parts that go hard under my tongue, her hand rests in my hair, and I know it’s okay if I get lost in her. I’m kissing down her stomach, and then back up to find her curves.

Ali is like my treasure, and I’m going to make sure she knows it every day forward. I taste and touch her with my mouth, my need for her driving me to be desperate as I worship her, coaxing sounds from her in response to my kisses.

During this, she opens my jeans, a clear message that everything goes tonight, and now that I know we’re going to have sex soon, I have to keep the images out of my mind, but they’re starting up, because she’s just too incredible.

When I’ve taken my fill of her breasts, for now, I come back to her mouth, and she holds me there while we start to kiss again.

I feel her moving while she takes off her panties, and then her hand goes to my waist and behind my back, inside the top of my jeans, and goes to draw me in tight against her.

I start to push my jeans down, not wanting to lose our kiss any more than she seems not to want to, and then she’s stroking my arm and running her hand up and down.

When it’s time for us to make love, Ali pulls me on top of her again, and covers our bodies with the rug. Our eyes meet as I settle down in the gap between her thighs and hold myself to slide into her tightness.

She smiles like it’s something she’s always needed to happen, and I close my eyes and bend down to breathe against her lips, not wanting her to see how much it means to me to be inside her.

Her hands come behind me into the small of my back, and she guides me deeper into heaven, as I groan softly. We start to move together, a slow rhythm, deep and unhurried for the longest time. I kiss her, and sometimes she looks up at me with this look of wonder.

With every second, I fall deeper in love with her, of course.

She uses her hands to explore how my muscles feel when I’m tensing to move inside her, and I realise how much I need to bend down to kiss along her shoulder, to follow her collarbone with my tongue, back to her throat, and find the softest places in her neck. With each touch of my lips, I adore her.

I know she loves the way we are connected, she’s telling me with her eyes, and with her kiss, but Ali is enjoying it more than just that, which I can feel when her fingers start to slide up my back, tightening and driving me on.

It isn’t too long after that when I press in harder to her, not so slowly now, but knowing that I won’t be able to bear it for long, hoping she doesn’t mind.

I can feel my control slipping away, can feel everything drawing in tight and I will no longer be able resist finding my end in her sweet body. We’re kissing and she’s watching me in between, when it becomes too much and I groan and let go into her softness. Things go white, perfect, unbearable.

She welcomes my release as if it was her own, the feeling almost too overwhelming for me, as I bite back the words one more time, Ali, I love you, so _fucking_ much.

She strokes my face through my come down, and I lie my cheek between her breasts and close my eyes while she smooths my hair, her fingers little points of warmth on my scalp.

I have to think of other things to say, but I don’t remember them. It’s just the one thing for a few minutes, so I let her hold me to her, until we are both soothed and calm and complete.

Then I get up on my knees a little higher, which forces her legs apart, and I’m still inside her, needing to hold her face and put my hands on her there so that I can kiss her, until I’ve had as much of that as I can take without breathing properly.

Eventually, I slip out, and draw her back over into my arms again, and her perfect body finds a way to fit along me like she’s part of me. I hold her with my arm locked tight for a little while, just so she’s knows she’s not allowed to get away yet.

I hear her sigh of contentment, a sound which means there’s nothing left for me to dream of, because I’ve got it all.

When I eventually relent and loosen my hold on her, she begins to rub lightly back and forth across my stomach, so slowly she barely moves.

She turns to look at me, after that, shifting in my arms to put her chin on my chest.

One finger draws briefly on my lips. I smile, because how can anyone be as beautiful as she looks right now.

She speaks softly. “I’ve missed this face.”

Her hand falls onto my cheek and I lean into it. “Even when I was furious with you,” she says, “I missed this face. If I can be honest, that probably made me even more angry.

I smile and say simply, “I’ve missed everything about you.”

Ali’s hand on my stomach moves again, and starts to come up to my chest. She says, with a naughty smile, “I’ve missed this, too.”

“I see.”

“Since that soccer game, I haven’t been able to get this out of my head, you tease.”

I laugh out loud, scornfully. “How about you don’t even start? Do you honestly think I’m ever going to forgive you for wearing that sweater?”

She grins. “So you noticed that, huh?”

I groan. “Yes, I _noticed_ , just like you wanted me to. Tell me right now. Did you wear that because you planned on letting me under there, or did you literally want to murder me?”

She bites her lip and looks sheepish. “I didn’t set out to be cruel, I promise that much. I didn’t know what I would do that night. The possibility was definitely in my mind.”

I sigh heavily. “Well, if you’re willing to wear that in front of me again, now that I’m allowed to put my hands on you, I might consider letting it go.”

“I’m sure we can arrange something.”

Ali settles back against me, and I hold her close.


	16. Wednesday 5, Part 3: New Year’s Eve, 1986

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to rebates912, MandyJ, ToriTarantino84, InvisibleObserver13, KingKarate and Ysabel for your very generous comments either here or at the Jimmy fic. They are so appreciated! That spin-off and KingKarate's 'Rising Tide' both updated since the last Malibu chapter :)
> 
> Hope everyone enjoys this one, a chapter with Johnny and Ali, the new couple.

We lie there for a while longer, until I think we must have been gone for a long time.

“Do you wanna go back?” I ask quietly.

“Yes and no, but we should.”

It’s a loss when Ali moves away from me and starts to get dressed, but I join her.

“I guess people are gonna wonder that we were gone ages, huh?” I ask.

She shrugs. “I’m sure they wondered that the other night, too, and the first time we went for a walk, yet we came back and nothing had happened, so who knows.”

“Tommy reckons people have been talking.”

“I know they have,” she says with a little smile. “My friends are pretty split on whether this is a good idea or not. Although, I have to say, there are more of them on your side than not.”

I can guess which side Susan is on.

“Everyone else, too, though,” I say. “I’ve noticed it, them trying to work out what the fuck’s going on.”

“Right. I guess we must be fascinating.”

“Well,” I say, putting my charm into it as my eyes move over her face, “one of us is…”

Ali smiles smugly. “Well, thank you. You noticed.”

She’s getting to her knees, but I kneel up and stop her from going any further, taking her hands and drawing her to meet me.

I need one last kiss, although there’s this fiercely happy thought running wild in my head that actually I can now do this pretty much anytime I want, when she’s with me. Ali turns her head, smiling as we kiss just lightly, sweetly.

She looks at my watch. “It’s only 1:20.”

“Right,” I say, getting up. “Let’s go find out how that party is going.”

When we’re pretty much back, and the music is playing still, but quieter now, and softer stuff, I suggest, “We could just remove all doubt. If you want to.”

She gives me a look that means she likes that idea, and I follow her up the steps.

There are lots of voices, and when I make it to the patio, I find that’s because a whole bunch of people are standing out here talking in groups, beer bottles in hand.

Ali walks pretty much into the middle, where there’s an open space, and then stops and turns around to me.

I go to her and put my hands up to her cheeks to hold her, at the same time as she wraps herself around me, and she gives me this huge smile, like all is right for her now, and I pull her in to kiss me.

One loud cheer goes up, maybe Jimmy, I think, a split second before it gets buried in dozens more, and I can hear my friends among the voices. People start whistling and shouting out all sorts of congratulations, or comments that it took me long enough, things of that kind.

Ali smiles against my lips and kisses me some more, and I take her into my arms.

*

It seems like the next fucking hour is people wanting a clear update, details, or to tease us, although I know it doesn’t really go that long. We pretty much have no choice but to go with it, letting our friends and whoever circulate around us, and draw us away from each other. The guys want to rib me, of course, and commiserate loudly with Ali, and Tina gives me a somewhat friendly and slightly scary warning that I had better do a good job this time. I let her know there’s nothing to worry about, that I’d die before I hurt her again.

Susan’s face is like it all doesn’t surprise her, but she deigns to speak to me pretty much in the way she has been lately.

“I knew she’d fall for your tricks,” she says in a tired voice. “I just want you to know, I’ve got my eye on you.”

“I don’t doubt it. I know it’s a waste of time telling you I don’t have any tricks, but I have to say it. I don’t care if you don’t believe me.”

“Well, I’m glad you know that I _don’t.”_ She crosses her arms, but there isn’t the same fight in it there was, nor in my words to her.

“I’m going to prove you wrong,” I say. “When I do, I wonder if you’ll admit it.”

She rolls her eyes and gives a scornful smile. She goes off to Connie and Jennifer, shaking her head at me just in case it wasn’t clear that she’s not going to agree that easily.

Barbara and Bobby appear at my side.

“Not so bad, really,” Barbara says. “I mean, she’s been way worse about you. You’re getting the light version, now.”

I grin, imagining the kind of things Susan would say to her friends.

Bobby puts an arm around my neck. “Well, I was starting to lose faith. I’m glad you finally pulled it off with Ali.”

“She made it pretty hard on you, didn’t she?” Barbara says, with what I see as an unnecessary laugh. “I felt so sorry for you. We could all tell, before she could, I think, what was gonna happen. Before she made up her mind, considering how she wouldn’t shut up about you.”

“Oh yeah?” I ask with interest. “What’d she say?”

“Don’t even think about it.”

“Yeah,” agrees Bobby. “She won’t tell me anything about the whole thing, so you’ve got no chance.”

He pulls her in for a hug, and I allow the next people to find me.

By the time my crazy friend comes up to me, I have news I need to check.

“Dutch, did you do a strip show, earlier on?”

He gives a proud laugh. “You heard about that?

“Yes, Steve was kind enough to share the disgusting details. On top of the coffee table, really?”

“People were eating it up, believe me,” Dutch says with a smirk.

I shake my head. “Thank fuck I didn’t have to see that.”

He gives me a pretty direct look. “You should thank me, Johnny. I saw Ali’s face when the two of you disappeared. You didn’t come back at midnight, so I’m guessing she gave you a happy new year.”

He pauses and looks at me for confirmation, and I hold in my smile. “No comment.”

He smirks. “Right. I figured I had to keep people busy up here, so you could have some quiet time with her.”

I stare at him, completely stunned, and unable to hide it. “You’re not as stupid as you look, are you?”

I see his fist coming toward the side of my ribs and I duck away, laughing.

*

I’m struggling to remember the point of this drinking game.

It’s something about facing off in pairs, standing on the coffee table, which is apparently now the center of most of the interesting things at the party. Someone waits nearby with bottles and shot glasses, handing them up to whoever is playing. People are acting pretty crazy, loud, and a few of the girls, and even a guy or two, have taken down streamers and wrapped them around their heads, and Josh is wearing a balloon tied to his waist, although I’m not sure I understand why.

I’ve had two turns, and won them both, downing my five drinks quicker than Tommy, and then Greg, and I’m pretty buzzed. That could also be the smoke that Dutch gave me on the patio, which he planned to share only with me and Tina, until Tommy found us and forced his way in.

Aaron took Josh down, and Ali’s up on the table now, and I think I like how out of character it is for her to be tipping back that shot, and the next, and it’s cute really, that she thinks she’s doing this real well, compared to Tina, who is an expert. Soon Tina is celebrating in her face, no surprise, and when Ali hops down, Dutch jumps up, and his shirt has by now disappeared somewhere, as it so often does.

They break the stride of the game by giving the drinks to each other, crossing their arms together like some dirty version of a bride and groom drinking. They look at each other, and they finish together and then start to make out, giving the room a different kind of show.

I laugh and go to see if Ali wants to be consoled, and I receive a happy kiss which tastes of a lot of scotch, and I let her sway against me, catching her before she loses her balance.

“You okay there?” I say, grinning down at her.

“You’re so big,” she says dreamily, slipping her arms underneath mine.

I know she doesn’t mean it that way, but I raise my eyebrow and smirk, and she starts to laugh.

“I what I want…” she tries, “what I want, is you to kiss me again. And this time, don’t stop.”

“As you wish.”

My lovely, drunken Ali.

*

She slows down the alcohol, which I think is a good idea for her sake, and she takes off with Susan for a while, and I can see them on the patio, laughing together.

Another time, we’re in a different group together, and she’s in front of me with her back up against me, and my arms wrapped around her while we talk to Steve and Meredith.

I know I want to spend time with just the five of us guys, so I kiss her goodbye, and even though it isn’t easy to round up Dutch, we all head down to the beach to sit together.

We’re in a line, looking at the night sea, talking about everything that’s been happening. Nobody comes to intrude.

We promise each other that we’re going to do karate again, as soon as we can.

We make plans to hang out one night next week for a bite, because Jimmy doesn’t go back to school until the following week, and we’ll do it again soon after that.

It won’t be the same. We won’t have as much time as we’ve had all these weeks, and we all come to realise that, while we’re sitting there.

Jimmy, sensible Jimmy, starts to talk about our spring break, and summer, and how he can take some holidays, and somehow that takes the edge off.

After we’ve been down there a while, Jimmy stands up. He’s pulling his t-shirt over his head.

“What the fuck?” Tommy says, laughing. “What are you doing?”

“Going for a swim.” He’s undoing his jeans, sliding them off. “Coming?”

“Oh, _fuck_ yeah,” Dutch says, jumping right up, and Tommy isn’t far behind.

Jimmy’s already walking down to the water in his boxer shorts, and Tommy is pleading with Dutch to leave his on, too, which surprisingly works, this time.

I laugh and shrug at Bobby, getting up off the sand.

“It’s going to be cold,” he warns, already pulling his shirt up, as he stands next to me.

“Yup,” I agree, and then we’re jogging to catch up to our friends.

I dive under a wave to get it over with, coming up gasping for a second, and then finding the guys are already engaged in a dunking fight, which I clearly have no choice but to join in.

Since I’m already immune to the cold, I can swim under Bobby and grab his thigh and push him up backwards as hard as I can so he goes under. He comes up enraged and launches at me, and I swim underneath a wave and change direction to evade him, coming up out of his reach.

“Fuck,” I hear Jimmy cry out, laughing, a few yards shallower than me. “I’d appreciate it if you don’t grab my nuts.”

“ _Oh_ ,” says Tommy. “Is that what those were? I thought someone had left some raisins lying around.”

Dutch dissolves into laughter, and then Bobby’s revenge, which I’d forgotten would be coming, arrives as his hands find the top of my shoulders and push me down below him.

We’re splashing and grabbing each other for ages. Tommy drags my boxers down my thighs when he can’t get any other grip on me, and I turn around and push him down beneath the surface with my weight, laughing, and pulling my shorts back up.

Jimmy chases Dutch into the shallow water to pay him back for something, and the rest of us follow, surrounding him, since he’s gotten all of us plenty of times.

“Nowhere to run,” Tommy warns him.

That’s about when we notice the line of five girls on the shore.

Four of them have their arms crossed, like we are children, and the one in the miniskirt is laughing.

We all stand to greet them, coming up out of the water so it’s down by our thighs. We seem to draw in together as we face our girls: Dutch is leaning on my shoulder, and Bobby’s got his hand on my neck, and Tommy calls out “See something you like?”

Jennifer says, “I see five idiots.”

“Who are gonna be freezing,” Barbara adds.

“I guess we’ll warm up somewhere,” I say, looking at Ali, who I think is biting back a smile.

Tina, who is basically a guy, except for in a few crucial ways, which I’m sure are important for Dutch, reaches behind herself to unzip her skirt, and then she shimmies out of it.

“Woo, yeah!” Dutch calls in encouragement, and I turn my eyes quickly away when she starts pulling her tank off, too, seeing only a flash of black underwear.

Tina’s dashing in, and Dutch is waiting to scoop her up into his arms, carrying her deeper. Jennifer gives this labored sigh to the other girls, and they head away back to the house. I figure this is way too immature, and cold for them, and Ali throws me a last look.

The four of us make tracks away from Dutch and Tina, who are now attached at the mouth, because we’re worried about what we might see or overhear, if we don’t.

I pick Bobby as our target, enjoying the fear in his eyes when all three of us make right for him.

The rest of our girls come back about five minutes later, with nothing but long t-shirts on, and carrying towels. They make a line of female thighs walking the sand, but only one pair attracts my attention as she starts to wade in.

Ali’s just about the first to make it out to us, and I hear Jimmy asking Jennifer, “Why does that shirt Barbara’s got on look familiar?”

“Because it’s yours,” she says. “They all are. Not _all_ of us want to go swimming in just our underwear. You don’t mind?”

He sighs and pulls her to him.

We’re all doing that, all separated into couples and giving each other plenty of space.

Ali sits across my lap in the shallow water, and it isn’t long until I realise her bra isn’t actually here at all, and neither is anything but the shirt.

“Holy fuck,” I mutter quietly. “Are you crazy?” The alcohol sure seems to have removed a lot of barriers, more than I would have thought possible.

“What?” she says innocently. “I didn’t want to get them wet. Don’t worry, no one saw a thing.”

I possessively think that they better not have, but I can’t help but admire how naughty Ali is tonight. I think it might be the sexiest thing that’s ever happened to me.

Right when I’m warring with the idea of touching her, with the implications and the restrictions of our company, she asks, “Are you gonna come over today?”

“If you’re inviting me. I was gonna ask if you might like to live in my bedroom, until Sunday.”

She smiles. “Maybe we can split it. My parents don’t get back from Aspen until Saturday afternoon.”

When we start kissing again, her hands move around under the water, and eventually I am forced to say quietly, “If you keep doing that, I’m going to need us to go back up the beach.”

“Why?” she murmurs. “They’re not that close...”

She’s trying to rearrange herself on my lap, making my eyes goes wide when I see what she’s thinking, and her hands slide behind me as she comes closer on my legs.

“Fuck,” I groan, fighting my impulse to go with it, because she’s _right there_ , but I know we can’t. If I let her keep going she will regret it later, be mortified about doing that, with her friends right there, and it’s not something I’ve ever done either. I doubt anything quite like that is happening around us, either, although I don’t want to think too much about Dutch.

I pick her up and move her gently away down my thighs.

She pouts. “You sure?”

“As much as I like the thought, and you can feel just how much, how ‘bout we cool it? Later on, you can have me to yourself if you want me.”

She puts her arms around my neck. “I do want you.”

She lets me resume kissing her without anything happening under the water, and it’s not that hard for me to relax, when I picture what I will be able to do with her later that day.

When we all decide to get out of the water, wrapping up with towels and then blankets doesn’t really do much to warm us up, and I still have wet boxer shorts. It’s about then that we realise that the girls’ decision to change wasn’t that stupid, since they are heading up to find their dry clothes. Jimmy heads inside, too, grumbling like he’s doing us a huge favor, and it’s a hardship, and he comes back, dressed, with a pile of boxers for us.

“You deviants may as well wear the rest of my clothes, why not?”

*

We go back up for some last dancing, some last craziness, some of which comes from Dutch, of course.

We eat again, and the music changes according to the mood.

Around six, the energy begins to wind down. Ali and I talk with other people for a while, then she takes my hand so we can go back down to the beach one last time, and sit by the ocean to watch the sunrise over the hills. And then maybe go to sleep for a few hours.

We cross the patio, past a few of our friends, some of them stifling a yawn, and others talking quietly.

Susan and Connie have pulled up two chairs together, and they’re not sitting particularly far away from where Tommy is with Steve and Greg.

We wave on our way past them, and I know that two of those people, at least, will be watching us and thinking whatever stupid, wrong thoughts they have about me and Ali being back together. I look forward to proving them both entirely wrong. Maybe I’ll even ask for an apology.

We start down the steps. The torches have all burned out, and no one will bother lighting them again, since the sky is already showing the first early signs of lightening up. Before we get to the sand, maybe halfway down, Ali drops down to sit on the steps, and I slide in next to her and put my arm around her to pull her into my side.

She nestles in there, and I kiss her hair, and rest my head on hers.

“And there goes the last domino,” we hear Susan say, not really keeping her voice down.

“I guess it was inevitable,” Tommy replies, his voice resigned, and now I realise why she spoke up that way: it was so he could hear, although it was pretty different to how her voice sounds on the few occasions I’ve heard her talk to him any time lately.

It’s the exes who are the two hold-outs about Ali and me, which hadn’t occurred to me before. I think back to how much time the four of us spent together when they were dating, which was a lot. Maybe the way they knew us then makes them think they know what will happen now, I guess, which might explain a lot.

“I guess we shouldn’t listen,” I whisper to Ali, worried about what I might hear, but she shushes me.

“You do what you like, but I’m going to.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Susan is saying. “He’s not _that_ irresistible, you know. Believe me.”

Ali pokes me lightly, grinning and then hugging me again.

I hear Tommy’s sigh. “Given how easy it would be for me to prove that you are apparently wrong about that, I won’t bother, but that’s not what I meant.”

Susan waits a moment before she says, “You’re right. I tried… I tried to talk some sense into her.”

“Same. With him.”

“I guess you had as much success as I did.”

“Yup.”

“Well, at least I guess I should be glad there are no more of your friends left to steal mine, because I’m fed up. It’s like everyone’s suddenly lost their minds.”

“Well, like you said,” Tommy replies smugly. “Some things are hard to fight.”

“Yes, like psychoses.”

“You keep telling yourself that.”

After a pause, Susan begins, “If he hurts her –”

“Oh, c’mon. Don’t start. It’s your friend I’m worried about. She’s going to break his heart again.”

Ali places a hand on my knee and squeezes me hard, letting me know that that prediction is way off.

“I still can’t believe she took him back. He doesn’t deserve her.”

“Well, that much is true,” I whisper into Ali’s hair, and rub my hand over her arm.

Tommy starts up a defence of me, and I can tell they are going to get to bickering at length about it.

Ali must be able to tell too, because she gives a soft laugh and gets up.

“Come on. Let’s go, before they find out we were listening.”

The sky is lighting the ocean steely grey. We lie down facing Jimmy’s but more to the side, to look up the beach, wrapped up together in a blanket, with Ali snuggled into my side, under my arm.

A few others start to head down too. I see Steve and Meredith, Greg, Josh, some of the girls, Freddy, and one by one each of my friends. Each couple or group finds somewhere to lie down, some wrapped in blankets like we are.

No one’s really talking, and we’re spaced out not too close to each other.

There’s the blue, dark above us, tinged paler where the clouds gather. We watch the orange pink creeping up from the horizon, pushing back the darker reds of its boundaries as it travels the sky, and coloring the clouds like cotton tufts underneath and shadowy grey above.

The golden light comes in a line that sweeps from the houses across the sea, widening as we watch, until the burnt yellow is chasing the pink away, and bringing the day with it.

We watch until it’s too bright for our eyes, and then we turn away, and I hold Ali while we fall asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sadly we are getting near the end now :'( Only one party to go, over two chapters, then the epilogue which occurs a little further into 1987.
> 
> Other than that, the tales will continue in Rising Tide, A Match Made in Heaven, and possibly a short Johnny/Ali story :) So the Malibu-niverse isn't coming to an end just yet x


	17. Saturday 5, Part 1: The Last Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Johnny and Ali <3
> 
> This is the final party, delivered in 2 chapters. It mostly about a lot of goodbyes, I guess, and the closures start or end here for many of the plots in the story. It’s about the things that have been regained by the various characters, or the things that have changed, and where it might go from here. You might have noticed that that even started last chapter, gently. That bigger picture continues in the next one, where we also see Johnny and Ali up close again. You’ll see this party from both Tina’s and later Jimmy’s POV, I’m sure :)
> 
> After Chapter 17 and 18, there’s a shorter epilogue, and we’re all done here in Malibu.

I’ll have had three days and three nights with Ali, counting tonight.

And then that’ll be it, so we have to make it count.

Every minute is something I would’ve been thankful for, at the start of this week, even for just one of them, but now I have them all, even if it’s not for long. When I can wake up next to her, or sit with her while we eat breakfast. When we can stretch out on the sofas next to each other, and watch TV, or I flick through a magazine while she reads her book. Or when I slip my arms around her when she’s making coffee, or she makes us something to eat and gives me a job to help because I want to be there with her.

When we get dressed together, or undressed whenever one of us decides it’s time to do that again instead, because neither of us can get enough. Ali basically loves sex now, pretty much as much as I do, and it’s blowing my mind to be with a girl like that.

When I can kiss her whenever the feeling takes me. When I can lean against the bathroom door and watch her in the shower, until she notices me and tells me to get in there. When I can stand next to her while we’re brushing our teeth, and when I can hold her at night, when we lie in her bed, and I wait until I feel her breathing change that means she has fallen asleep, and give her one last kiss on the top of her head.

She’s my girl, and these are the times we have. This is it, before our lives start up again on Monday.

It’s not nearly enough.

I think it’s crossed both our minds not to go to Jimmy’s tonight, because that would be four or five more hours we could spend just the two of us.

But it doesn’t feel right. This winter has to end with us together, with everyone.

We’ll go. We’ll stay as long as we stay, and then I’ll take her to my house tonight, and we’ll have our last night together before she drives back up. And then we will begin making this work out even though we’re apart. I’m sure it’ll take some time to learn, but we will.

Ali’s packed, and I leave before her parents get home. She wants to say goodbye to them, and let them know she won’t come home tonight, and once all that’s done, she drives to my house so we can go to the party together.

It’s comforting when we get to Jimmy’s at dusk, to see reminders of all the sights that have shaped our winter. We drive past Connie at the back door, just as Susan is opening it to let her in, and they smile at Ali as she waves at them. Dutch’s car is back in pride of place, huge and black. Tina’s bike is next to it. Tommy’s and Bobby’s cars are both here, with a spot in between them for us.

I take Ali’s hand as we walk back to the house.

Susan has waited for us just inside the hallway, perhaps to see for herself that we have made it successfully through the first part of our relationship.

“Hey,” she says, including me, although the smile is more for Ali.

Susan eyes our hands, and then gives a slight shake of her head, but I’ll be honest, it really is slight, almost like she can’t give up the fight yet, just for the sake of her pride.

We start into Jimmy’s with her, Ali between us.

The house has recovered from New Years’ Eve very well, and everything is in its place. We’re hardly the first here, more like the last. We’ve all dressed a little nicely tonight, since Jimmy wants a party like the first one, with catered food and the rest.

A crowd of chinos, and white jeans, and button downs greets us, and lots of the girls are wearing dresses, although not formal ones.

“Your two friends are already causing trouble down on the beach,” Susan tells me, in the tone of a joke, which for her means sarcastic, but not with a biting chill. She’s confident I’ll know which two she means, of course, because it couldn’t be anyone else. “Please tell me we won’t be subjected to any more degradation tonight.”

I smile guardedly, giving Susan a little credit for how she’s trying to act different with me for Ali’s sake. It’s also just about the first time she’s made any reference to me about Tommy without pure scorn, even though she didn’t say his name. I have to see it as progress.

“I’ll do my best,” I say. "Can’t make any promises.”

“I guess that’ll do.”

A bunch of our friends are migrating towards us from around the room, and I let go of Ali’s hand as we are circled and separated. She’s got most of her big group.

Steve leads the guys who come up to me and we greet each other with a back slap. “So you’re saying there won’t be another strip show?” he asks, flicking his eyebrows.

“Pity,” Freddy says. “I wondered if some of the girls might get involved this time.”

I grin, hoping Ali didn’t hear that.

We’re still standing and talking, with our second glasses of champagne, when some of my friends come in from the patio. Dutch is wearing a short sleeve shirt tucked into a nice pair of jeans, and seeing him clean up always makes me smile, because he’s really good at it, and it’s so at odds with his dirty mind, and general approach to life. Bobby, on the other hand, looks as pure as snow, far more convincing as a whole, in his pale green and white sweater.

They’ve left Tina behind out there with some others, and I note she’s back in her leather jacket and black jeans, having decided dress codes don’t apply to her, I guess.

“My man,” Dutch greets me, clasping my hand up like an arm wrestle.

“You been having a good few days?” Bobby asks me, with a knowing smile.

“None of your business. So what, you going for a job interview today, or something?” I look him up and down.

Bobby punches me lightly. “You’re just jealous you can’t pull this off as well as I can.”

Barbara joins us, and slides under his arm so that he has to put it up around her. She says in a sweet voice, “Nobody can pull it off as well as you, Bobby,” and kisses him on the cheek.

Dutch makes a choking sound, and I smirk.

Bobby goes red, but he draws her in tight. “Fuck off,” he says to us guys, but he’s smiling widely. “So I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to fit this party into your schedule or not.”

I shrug and look over at where Ali is, with Jennifer. “We wanted to come. Felt like we couldn’t miss it, although now that I’m with you, I can’t remember why.”

Bobby gets that I mean the opposite of what I just said; I can see that in his eyes.

This winter has felt like the old days with him and me, hanging out, and maybe especially getting so much time to talk when I was driving him, too. I’m going to miss him, even though I won’t say that out loud, not the words. Fortunately, we’re having dinner on Thursday, and I hope we’re gonna do a much better job of staying in touch after this.

Before we can get too sad or soft about anything, Dutch helps us out. He leans in to say, “I woulda thought you’d be keeping Ali locked away with you, Johnny, until the last minute.”

“Believe me, I tried. She keeps finding the key.”

Barbara smiles. “She’s going up tomorrow, hey?”

“Yeah.” I swallow. “In the morning.”

“I’m sorry it has to be like that for you guys.”

I nod, and ignore the flash of jealousy I feel toward her and Bobby, that these two won’t have to say goodbye the way we will. It’s not their fault I don’t have that, too.

“What about you and Tina?” I ask Dutch. “She still living in the Valley?”

“Yeah. Her dad’s shop’s in Arleta, and she’s trying to talk him into taking her on for real.”

We’re all looking out at Tina, now, and she notices. I don’t know what she thinks Dutch is saying about her, but she grins and flips him off, and us three guys start laughing.

Bobby’s eyes are dancing. “That’s one cool chick you got there.”

*

I find a chance to sneak Ali upstairs to the deck, because I figure we should say goodbye to the place where this all began.

I bring her against me, smiling while I smooth her hair, and then my finger under her chin brings her to me for a kiss.

It’s a big moment for me, thinking about that first night we talked, and then where we’ve made it to, at this second right here. And I wonder if it impacts Ali, as much as me. To have her soft mouth against me, feeling so much like home again after our last few days, all of my old feelings back about what it’s like to hold her.

 _More_ than that. More than the old feelings: she’s right. Ali was right when she said that to me on the beach last weekend. It’s going to be more than before, what we have now, and I don’t know if that’s because we’re older, or because we have fixed a lot of the shit, or because we know how to do this better: I have no idea.

But it is.

This is feeling like my whole world right now.

The way she holds me, the way she smiles at me when I come into a room where she is. The way she seems to see me all the way down. How she fits with me on the outside, like this, and on the inside, in a way I can’t understand. Standing here with her, the way I feel her arms coming around me to bring me into our quiet, complete place.

Just like when she first kissed me again, I feel like I could do just about nothing else but this forever, because our kiss has everything about us in it.

*

Jimmy’s got a bunch of torches down on the sand again, and so after the rounds of cocktail food upstairs, there’s another soccer game. This time it’s with a whole bunch of people, our year versus the year below, mostly guys. Bobby is the star of the show, with Greg a close second. Pretty much everyone else watches, and we win, of course, and then we have a fire on the beach.

I think most of us are taking the last chance to try to talk to everyone we can, at least a little bit, before people go away again, and we don’t see each other. It seems like the plan to catch up in spring has become pretty official. Even though we haven’t set where we’ll go, yet, it’s a nice thought that we can look forward to.

Samantha’s group from our year has started hanging out with Ali’s group, so that tonight there’s this one huge group of girls standing around together in their dresses and skirts, and lots of the guys are sitting down on the sand and watching them.

Some of us, like me and my friends, already have someone in that group, but a few other guys are checking out talent, and saying the kind of things they wouldn’t say when the girls are among us. They comment on things they see and like, they compare notes on things they know first-hand, and also discuss rumours about what certain girls are said to provide, but I’ve grown out of it, and I don’t take part.

Tommy’s joining in with the dirty talk, and when he realises Jimmy, Bobby and I aren’t, he gives us a hard time.

“Nothing wrong with looking, is there?”

Jimmy sighs and puts his arm around him. “My friend, one day, you will understand.”

“Fuck, I hope not,” Tommy laughs. “I don’t know what has gotten into all of you.” He pins Dutch with a hard look. “You, especially.”

Dutch is holding a lazy finger up, with an unbothered smile, but Josh says from behind us, “Isn’t it more what Dutch has gotten into?”

Tommy and Freddy start cackling, and do nothing to intervene when Dutch wrestles Josh into the sand. “You better take that back,” he says menacingly, sitting on top of Josh, and none of us are sure how much he’s joking.

“Okay, okay!” Josh protests. “So your girl is off limits.”

“Damn straight. Don’t forget it.”

When they’ve subsided, Tommy gives us a look of dismay.

“Seriously. What the fuck’s happened to you guys? Settling down at your age?”

Bobby laughs. “No one’s settling down, Tommy. If you find an amazing girl, your priorities change.”

Tommy shakes his head. “I’m so disappointed in you all.” He looks sadly at me, and ends on Dutch. “Tying yourselves down to one woman. Where’s the sense in that?”

Dutch shrugs. “I’m not tied down.”

“So you’re still gonna pick up other girls, then?”

“Nah, I doubt it. Don’t need to.” Dutch smiles. “It’s hard to explain. Sometimes lightning just strikes, you know?”

“And fries your brain,” Tommy suggests.

I add, “You know that happened a while ago with him, right?” and before Dutch can try to punch me, I put my arm around his neck. “I’m proud of you, you know? All these years, we had no hope for you.”

“Fuck you,” Dutch says, grinning.

“At this rate, you might even turn into an adult,” Bobby says, and then widens his eyes. “Shit, you might even be respectable one day, Dutch.”

“Don’t say shit like that to me. Not if you want to keep the body parts you need to keep Barbara happy.”

“Anyway,” Jimmy says, bringing it back to Tommy. “What about Erin?”

Tommy stares neutrally at him. “She’s a nice girl. We had a fun winter.”

“And?”

Tommy shrugs slightly. “And what?”

Jimmy gives me a slightly sad look, but we’re not surprised that has basically run its course, since this is about the usual amount of time. Tommy likes the company, but either can’t or won’t let it go deeper than that, and to be fair I think he must be pretty up front about it with the girls, because he doesn’t really leave a trail of destruction these days, from what I’ve observed. Erin’s over there in the group: I can see her, and she seems pretty happy talking to some of the girls from Ali’s year.

I don’t really get why he’s like he is, or maybe I _do,_ but I don’t know there’s anything I can do about it.

“Bigger and better things,” Dutch suggests.

“Exactly,” Tommy agrees. “Believe me, they’re out there.” He’s looking across at the group of girls, although whether he has a specific target is unclear. I get the feeling he might, already, but time will tell.

Dutch slaps his knee, and says with some finality, “Well, make sure to have fun for all of us.”

Tina's broken away from the group over there, and she heads over with no fear to join us, and Dutch smiles and takes her hand, pulling her down to sit with us.


	18. Saturday 5, Part 2: The Last Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter of goodbyes, including the big one. And then next chapter (epilogue), I show you Johnny and Ali making it work like champions.
> 
> There’s a slight bittersweet tone at the end of Malibu, and that’s because I feel that is what fits. This couple has been through so much and they have found each other again, but life is complicated. If you’re looking for me to break any tension that still exists at the end of this chapter, then you’re looking for the epilogue, which has a slight time skip, and a vision of their future life :) I think you’ll like it. It makes me happy every time I read it.
> 
> The latest Malibu spin-off has been posted, a new one, written by KingKarate and I, and its title is Violet Bloom. It concerns Susan :)
> 
> In probably a couple of weeks, I’ll also post that standalone Johnny/Ali minific that some of you know I’ve been writing, which fits in this universe. And in the meantime I will be writing more minifics of them. Now I have gotten them fixed, I am going to have a lot of fun with them and give you little snapshots of their lives. I’ll probably post it as an open ended multi-chapter, even though it’s not a single story, per se.
> 
> Thanks everyone. I’ll be saying that in more detail next chapter, but for now, thank you.

Everybody hangs out inside for a while, because it’s cold, and not long after nine, I start to pick up that Ali would like to leave. We say a few of the goodbyes to the big group, and then I head out to the turnout with my friends just for a last time with them, while she stays with Barbara and Susan.

Dutch sits just up on the hood of his car, and the other guys are leaning against it.

I’ve got my arms crossed, standing in front of them, and I look at Jimmy. “Like I said the other night, thanks for making this happen. We owe you, man.”

Jimmy’s wearing a serene smile. “You sure do. I’m thinking about what I’ll ask for in return, especially considering that it’s thanks to me some of you hopeless cases now have a girlfriend, too.”

Bobby and Dutch laugh together, but I just look at my friend, hoping he knows that I recognise there’s truth in that in my case, and I am very grateful for it, although I also meant it for how it’s given the five of us the chance to spend so much time together, that now it feels like the old days again.

“Seriously, though,” says Bobby. “Thanks, Jimmy.”

“Yeah, you’re the best, man,” Dutch adds, and Tommy leans over to slap him on the back.

“Well,” I say. “I’m gonna go get Ali, so I guess this I goodbye.” I can’t resist taunting Jimmy, “I’d ask you to do the soft chick shit for us, but Tommy might start crying, so maybe you better not.”

It’s about as close as any of us get to saying how we feel.

“Thursday?” Tommy says to me.

“Thursday. And let’s talk about training.”

“Right on,” Dutch agrees.

“And just how are you gonna make that work?” Bobby asks. “I woulda thought you’re gonna have pretty busy weekends from now on.”

“I have no idea,” I admit, “and you’re right. I am gonna go up and see Ali every weekend for a while. I still have time for you guys, though.”

“Aw, that’s sweet,” Dutch says.

“Fuck off.”

“You might want Jimmy to take over, if you’re starting the chick shit, after all?”

Tommy sighs dramatically. “See, I warned you. This is what having a girlfriend will do to you. You’re all turning into a bunch of -”

Dutch launches on him first, but the rest of us aren’t that far behind.

*

I have another goodbye to work on, and it’s way harder.

It started before now, I guess, but it really kicks in for me once I’ve parked, and we’re getting out at my house.

“Come here,” Ali says to me, while we’re standing at the front door.

I swallow and let her pull me in while she lifts her arms up around my neck.

“It’s only been four days, Johnny, but in another way, it’s been a lot more time.”

I nod, and my chest is so full of her, of how it feels to hear she’s getting that, too.

“I would have waited for you for much longer.”

She smooths my hair out of my eyes. “I’m sorry you had to.”

“I’m not.” It feels like a risk, feels like I could say far too much right now, before Ali’s ready to hear it. “I know you needed to decide to come back to me so that you wouldn’t leave again.”

She smiles to break me completely in two. “I can’t leave you, Johnny. I… the way I feel about you…”

I tilt her head so that she has to kiss me, because I know she wants to finish that sentence, but I don’t want her to feel pressured to, yet; she’s told me enough for me.

*

Ali and I are in my room. She’s sitting on my lap on my bed, me sitting up against the headboard, and I’m memorising everything about her face to begin with, although I can start on her body any time I’m ready, seeing as how neither of us are wearing anything.

“I must be crazy,” I say. “Letting you go tomorrow.”

She touches over my cheek and smiles, and I don’t like her eyes looking so bright and sad, since I’m trying not to focus on that feeling myself.

“I’ll call you when I get there.”

“You better,” I warn. “Otherwise I’ll come up there.”

“Well, you’d better call me Monday night. We can tell each other everything about the first day back.”

I swallow, looking up at her, and tightening my arms. “I don’t know if it’s going to be enough for me, Ali.”

“It _won’t_ be enough for me. But for now it’s what we have, so we’re going to have to make it work. And Friday will be here before you know it. We’ll be together by dinner time, and we’ll have the whole weekend.”

“And you’re not gonna let some Stanford guy come and sit next to you, and steal you away from me?”

She smiles slyly and starts drawing on my lips. “Well, he’d have to be really pretty to compete with this. And how about you? How do I know you’re not gonna forget about me once you’re busy at college again?”

Maybe because I’m never going to look at another girl again. I don’t say that, in case it would scare her, but it’s how I feel, and she probably does suspect that, anyway. My hand behind her neck brings her down to kiss me again, because it feels like the best way I can really show her my answer to anything.

She’s moving her hips a little to bring her body in closer to a really nice position. She sighs, “This reminds me of Wednesday night…”

I mutter, “Trust you to look so happy about that.”

“What?”

I roll my eyes at her terrible effort at innocence. “When you threw yourself at me, and left it to me to have to say no?”

Her shoulders shake a little with her laugh. “Come on, it wasn’t that bad…”

God, I love her. My beautiful little tormenter will never be done with me, and there’s nothing quite like the feeling of watching her enjoy driving me crazy, knowing that eventually she’ll pretty much always let me have what I want.

“You’re a fucking tease, and I promise you, I very nearly failed that test you set me.”

She raises her eyebrows. “What makes you think it was a test?”

I squeeze her hips with both hands, making sure my thumbs dig in where I know she’s ticklish. I’ve got a list of those places in my head, now, and they come in handy for all sorts of reasons.

She shudders in surprise, just about giggles, and tries to get away, but I hold her firmly so she doesn’t get far

“What makes you think I’ll believe it wasn’t?”

“I was drunk,” she argues, smiling. “I didn’t mean it that way.”

“And I wasn’t? Tell me, what would have happened if I’d let you have what you wanted, huh? You’d be okay with that, remembering getting laid in front of our friends?”

She bites her lip.

“Exactly,” I say. “And did you even thank me, yet?”

She laughs again, and my eyes drop down, unable not to notice such wonderful movement, when it’s in front of my face.

“That’s basically cheating to win your point,” I tell her, as my hands come up to hold her there, because I can’t not touch them.

“Maybe I’m thanking you, now.” She follows this by circling me with her hand, and my eyes flicker closed as I lean back on my headboard.

I murmur contentedly, “Well, it’s about time.”

She strokes me slowly, and she watches me start to enjoy that, and pretty soon I’m putting my mouth on her lovely soft skin, kissing that perfection.

“I’m going to spend a lot of time thinking about these, this week.”

She lifts up and moves closer to me, her hand holding me so that she can sit down all the way onto me, and that feeling is better every single time. Her soft, tight heat closes me inside, and I sound my pleasure against her breast.

Her hands fall on my shoulders, and she rocks slowly into me. “And about doing this?”

“And this,” I agree, staring up at her, loving her. “I’m not okay with you taking my favorite things away.”

The look in her eyes fills every part of me again, and she fits her lips with mine.

We work up in her rhythm together as she grinds her hips down over and over, and I’m holding her waist with both hands, sharing the heat of our kiss, trying to keep the sounds of how good this is to ourselves.

Ali tips her head back, thrusting her breasts forward. She begins to move with more purpose, and I’m meeting her body, pressing up, biting my lip. She’s as into it as I am, which means I need to slip my hand over her mouth when she starts to forget to be quiet, and my other hand in between us, just to make sure for her.

There’s nothing like that look in her eyes, that helpless bliss that flashes when she starts to get near, like she’s begging me not to stop, like I ever would.

She’s moaning against my fingers, her need and her joy so pure that the sight sends me over the edge, and the sharpness of relief takes over my senses while I surrender to the ultimate feeling with her, blinding, overwhelming, divine. There’s her tight grip on my shoulders, the tense shudders in her body, which always linger past mine, which I hold her through, my hand on her face now starting to caress her instead, because she’s past the first and most intense part of her release, and her eyes always find me again, smiling as her feelings slowly, slowly recede.

Ali comes down against me after, and my arms wrap tightly around her, in no hurry to separate our bodies.

I love you, I think in my head, and I have a feeling it might not be that long until I’m going to be able to say it.

I sigh and stroke her hair, and she slips her arms in underneath mine to hold me, resting her weight on me while I keep her there.

We stay for a long time in our embrace.


	19. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone. Can’t really describe what it’s been like to plan and write this story, and tweak it for months into this shape, and then summon up the courage to post it, and then have people read it. It’s been an absolute gift. And to have someone create a fanfiction of it to extend the universe, and based on an OC of mine, has been a mindtrip that has me shook in the best way. KingKarate, you’re amazing, and I kinda don’t know if I believe you’re real, still. I’m sorry. Some things are too good to be true :)
> 
> Into 2021, I will be adding to A Match Made in Heaven (Jimmy, Jimmy/Jenny – currently up to Chapter 3) and soon starting to post minifics in my new work Malibu in Miniature (Johnny/Ali), which show you some of their happy future times and stories. King Karate will continue Rising Tide (Dutch/Tina) and we will together add to Violet Bloom (Susan, Tommy/Susan – currently up to Chapter 3). Hope you enjoy :)
> 
> If you’ve commented, liked or given kudos to my story, thank you. The readership grew during the telling, but as expected, still stayed relatively small for this fandom due to the ship (which I get <3). BUT proportionally there was SO much vocal support out of that reading group – it just blows my mind!!! You have been such amazing readers! Here and on tumblr/discord. It’s dangerous to attempt an overall AO3 roll call, but I’m going to anyway, because I like danger. In alphabetical order, thank you to: InvisibleObserver13, Jules1980, KingKarate, LMT, MandyJ, rebates912, Sam, SecretSecret, ToriTarantino84 and Ysabel. If I’ve missed anyone and I realise it, I’m going to come back and add your name here. Your words have made this such a special experience for me. I’ve loved hearing your theories and what you’ve enjoyed, and you’ve said such kind things. I go back and read them, because words mean a lot to me, and I’ll always be grateful you took the time to tell me :)
> 
> And thank you to everybody else who has read this story, too. I hope you all like the end.
> 
> I’m more proud of this story than anything I’ve ever written, and yet I look forward to improving for the next epic saga that drops into my head. If you have been reading Malibu, or if you read this at any later stage, I’d like to ask you one last time, please, to let me know what you think, what you enjoyed, how you felt when they got back together. It would mean **so much** to me to hear :) If you don’t have an account, it doesn’t matter – I’ve got guest comments open. Cheers!
> 
> Thanks, everyone. It’s been a ride. Goodbye for now <3

**Friday**

**Nine weeks later**

With Friday traffic, my campus is still less than fifteen minutes to John Wayne, although it takes a while to walk from the carpark.

Once I take off, it’s only an hour and a half until I’m in San Jose. Assuming I don’t have anything on at college that I can’t get out of, and assuming it hasn’t been too long since I’ve been to see Mom, I’ve been staying the whole weekend up there, most times.

Today, once I find my seat on the plane, I reach into my satchel for the parcel that Ali had Fed-Exed to me during the week. She could have easily given it to me last weekend, or this one, but I think she wanted me to have a surprise. The instructions on the front said not to open it until I’d boarded, but I gave into temptation this morning and had the briefest look, and I’ve been thinking of it, of her, pretty much all day since.

Clearly she’s been working on it for a while.

When I open it up again, there’s the brown leather folio she’s put her work inside. It’s a set of organised notes she’s made for me about her research, that I had no idea she’d even been doing. She has set out a page or two of information about each of some various dojos in Orange County, within about half an hour’s drive of my campus in any direction. Some of the pages have a flyer or business card stapled at the top of the page, and those that don’t have her handwritten information with the sensei, phone number, class times, the address, and things like that.

Under that, Ali has written her impressions down for me, explaining what she thinks I might find appealing about each option, and what she learned in conversation with the senseis. It’s hard to imagine how much time it must have taken her to be so thorough, and she explains that these are the top ten choices, and I wonder how many others she discarded.

Some of these dojos are ones I’ve already visited, but one is new, and a few I haven’t heard of, so I will definitely consider any of them as a possibility, given that it’s been a while since I tried anywhere, so things might have changed.

I spend the flight reading, and thinking about what Ali says there, and by the end of it, I must admit I’m feeling quite hopeful that maybe I will be able to take up my sport again, after all. It’s a missing part of me, and I think I need to fill it in. The anticipation that perhaps I can do that, get back to training regularly, find a new sensei, and the happiness it’s giving me, is still well in play by the time I’m getting out of the cab in the city.

Ali usually meets me at the hotel. We gave up seeing each other at Stanford pretty quick. She snuck me into her room a few times, but a sorority isn’t really the greatest place for privacy, or for peace and quiet like we want together, so we came to our senses, and started to book somewhere to stay. Now we have a standing hotel reservation on Fridays and Saturdays.

I push on the revolving door, and I can already see her through the glass, sitting in the lobby waiting for me.

She stands up from the lounge seat, smiling, and my chest goes tight. She’s got her hair in a white band, and this pretty white sundress on, with blue and yellow flowers, and she looks as perfect as a picture.

She starts to close the distance between us. I drop my bag and take her into my arms, her perfume, her warmth, her light all around me, and she kisses me like it’s been a lot more than five days.

Then I hold her face with one hand, and take her in, just to make sure I’ve remembered everything.

Ali’s holding fistfuls of my sweater, her eyes shining up at me. “Hey.”

“Thank you,” I say thickly, because I’m overcome by her gift, by her knowing how much that would mean to me.

Ali kisses my lips again. “Do you think it might help?”

“I know it will. You’re amazing.”

“You deserve it.”

I stroke over her cheek, my heart sore, as it always is when I first see her. “Why do I miss you so much?”

“I guess it’s just me being wonderful.”

I smile. “Must be.”

“It’s been a long week for me, too.” It takes me only a second to realise she doesn’t mean this just in a romantic way, by the way she’s staring pretty intently.

“That bad?” I tease, and her warning look has me picking up my bag. She always checks us in when she gets here, so I that means I can take her hand and lead her to the elevators.

As soon as the doors close, she’s got her arms up around my neck, and she’s kissing me again, getting pretty intimate with it, really, and her hand is wandering, and I’m laughing and telling her she better cool it for just a few more seconds, even though my body responds quickly. There’s only so much we can achieve over the phone, so I know exactly where she’s coming from.

In our room, I finally let her fly into my arms the way she wants to, a ball of energy that I circle tight inside my hold.

She’s staring at me with a fiery look in her eyes, and there’s not a single thing in the world better than that, because I know what it means.

“Do you have any idea how much I love you, Johnny?” she tells me. “Like even a _single_ clue?”

It still just about shatters my heart, in the good way, every time Ali says that to me, and she sure likes to say it.

I kiss her as deeply as I can, until I feel her fierce energy morph into something with softer edges, but more potent depth.

I say, “When I’m away from you, I spend pretty much every minute, from when I wake up, until I go to sleep, thinking about doing this. About how much longer it is until I get to do this. It can’t possibly be as much as I love you.”

“Don’t even try it,” is her reply, with passion still coloring everything about how she looks. “The best part of my day, and sometimes the only part of my day I even care about, is when I get to hear your voice at night.”

I slip my hands down her pretty dress, tracing her through the thin fabric, and down to her thighs, so she knows that I want to pick her up with her legs around my hips.

She helps me to by jumping up, and I carry her to the bed, where I start to show her exactly how much I’ve missed her.

That’s more or less how it goes every week, and if things are going to cool down to something calmer, less intense, it hasn’t happened yet. We’ll make love twice today. Sometimes, it’s even more, and the hot tub through there is often involved. Only the first time is a frantic rush, because the others can go for what seems like hours, while we keep learning ways to make each other scream, and beg for more.

The rest of the time, we just talk, or we might watch something on TV while we lie in bed, wrapped around each other. There’ll be room service, and tomorrow morning we will start again, although we always go out for breakfast, and sometimes lunch, too. Maybe one day, we’ll do tourist stuff, who knows.

Next weekend, Ali’s coming down to me, and we’re going to Jimmy’s with the guys. We might end up alternating the trips that way, if we want to. The best part is, we can do whatever we choose to do, and every weekend we will be together for most, if not all of it. It makes it feel like we’re barely apart, by the end.

Wherever we are, it’ll be Saturday afternoon before we think about doing our work, and occasionally we leave it until Sunday, but it always gets done, well.

After all, we both have big plans for the future.

**The end.**

**Postscript**

It’s a little over a year later that friends and family of Johnny and Ali receive the following in the post

Their parents insist on a lavish wedding, but Ali and Johnny inject some of their own style into it, as you can see by the details on the invite :)

[P. P. S. If you’re wondering, Sid’s welcome/mysterious absence from that invite will be explained at a later date in Malibu in Miniature]

**Really the end, this time.**

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Rising Tide](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27775645) by [KingKarate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KingKarate/pseuds/KingKarate)
  * [Riding](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27778042) by [StrikeLikeACobraKai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrikeLikeACobraKai/pseuds/StrikeLikeACobraKai)
  * [A Match Made in Heaven](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27929650) by [StrikeLikeACobraKai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrikeLikeACobraKai/pseuds/StrikeLikeACobraKai)
  * [Violet Bloom](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28167246) by [KingKarate](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KingKarate/pseuds/KingKarate), [StrikeLikeACobraKai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrikeLikeACobraKai/pseuds/StrikeLikeACobraKai)
  * [Malibu in Miniature](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28369617) by [StrikeLikeACobraKai](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StrikeLikeACobraKai/pseuds/StrikeLikeACobraKai)




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